Views Across the Sea from Cleveleys

On a clear day from the coast you can see land to the left, right and ahead. Enjoy spectacular views across the sea from Cleveleys – what can you pick out?

The coastline curves eastwards as it heads north towards Fleetwood. So when you look to your right you can’t actually see Fleetwood seafront from Cleveleys. As you travel to Fleetwood along the coast road, the view of Morecambe Bay and the Lakes changes completely. The windfarm seems to move, and familiar landmarks appear in different places! Explore this different view here.

Views Across the Sea to the North

Look to your right along the coast to Morecambe Bay for a great view – on all but the cloudiest of days. You can see the hills of the Lake District, the shipyard at Barrow and the power station at Heysham. This is what you can see, marked on a photo:

The shipyard at Barrow is the group of white buildings at the far left edge of the land. The detail in the landscape changes according to the weather conditions.

Dusted in snow in winter, the hills look picture-postcard-perfect on a clear day. On a really good day, at any time of the year, you can even see the wind turbines on the hills.

Take a look in these photos, all from different days and times of year:

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Views Across the Sea of the Windfarms

Poor weather blocks out sight of the turbines of the offshore windfarms in the Irish Sea. But they’re usually visible, now part of the views across the sea. It looks like one big windfarm from land, but it was actually built in separate phases and construction is ongoing. The first turbines to be erected were the Barrow Offshore Windfarm.

The Walney Offshore Windfarm was built in 2010. The cable for the second phase of 51 turbines comes ashore up the beach at Cleveleys. It was installed during the summer of 2011. There’s an interesting information board against the beach, roughly at the end of Thornton Gate. It explains how the high voltage cable, direct from the windfarm, arrived at Cleveleys beach on a very big boat!

Views Across the Sea of the Isle of Man

Face straight ahead, and look to about 1 o’clock. On a really clear evening, with a bright sunset you might see the outline of the hills of the Isle of Man on the horizon. You can even see the Tower of Refuge on the top of Conister Rock – if the conditions are right.

But it’s so far away that you shouldn’t be able to see it… So find out why you can view of the Isle of Man here.

Views of Wales – across the Sea to the Left/South

Depending on where you are on the coastline, looking along the coast to the left you can clearly see the Norbreck Castle Hotel, The Blackpool Tower and North Pier.

Further to the right of those familiar landmarks, across the sea, lie North Wales and Anglesey. On clear days you’ll see them as a series of hills across the water. You might mistake the bumps of land for clouds at first! The view becomes clearer as you travel south on the coast road towards Blackpool.

How the View of Wales relates to the Map

Take a look at the map below – we’ve marked it out to show the wide angle of view that you can see.

The clearest view is usually of the western edge of the Isle of Anglesey, seen at the left of the map. On a really clear day you can sometimes see the landmass of North Wales – where Llandudno, Colwyn Bay Rhyl and Prestatyn curve around the shoreline to meet Birkenhead.

The Hills of Snowdonia

The big green area on the above map is Snowdonia. The hills of this National Park are often visible, because they are so high. The points that you can most often see are usually the hills of the National Park of Snowdonia.

Standing at 3560 feet above sea level, Mount Snowdon is nearly 7 times higher than The Blackpool Tower. The Blackpool Tower is 518ft tall, so imagine how high 6.87 of them would be – stacked one above the other!

It’s the hills of Snowdonia National Park that you can see in the next photo. This was taken from Cleveleys beach on 1 October 2017. The big bump at the left is the hills of the northern end of Snowdonia. The smaller bump at the very right of the photo is Anglesey.

The next photo is taken from Rossall Beach – it’s the steps adjacent to the cafe, clearly visible in the foreground. The hills of Wales and their windfarm are clear in this shot.

Wind Farms…

The wind farm in the photo is Gwynt y Môr. Opened in June 2015 it cost over £2 billion to construct. It’s 160 turbines are built by RWE Innogy UK in Liverpool Bay, off the North Wales coast.

…and Ships Sailing on the Sea

Although it’s not a shipping lane as such, from the coast at Cleveleys you’ll see a variety of ships and boats making their way across the Irish Sea. 

On Christmas Eve 2010 the last ferry bound for Larne in Ireland sailed out of Fleetwood.

Did you know? You can follow the journey of ferries and ships with a website called ShipAIS. It plots their movement across the seas, explaining who they are and where they’re going.

As lenses and camera technology improve (and we add to our collection!) the photos we can take of this far away landscape get better and better. Don’t despair though, more often than not this is the kind of view that you’ll see in reality!

Look Inland – see the Forest of Bowland

If you love the sea you’ll probably spend most of your time looking over it towards the horizon. But you’ve probably also seen the hills in front of you when you turn around and look inland, away from the coast. As the Fylde Coast is so flat, it’s a pretty good view of the Forest of Bowland, looking over Cleveleys and Thornton. See it in this next photo, looking over the fields at Rossall School.