Lunderston Bay

A walk from Inverkip to Lunderston Bay

It’s a 45 minute journey on the train from Glasgow Central to Inverkip on the Inverclyde coast. From the station it’s just under a mile through the village & round the marina to reach the beach & shoreline. Rudy walked to Lunderston Bay just under two miles north along the coastal path.

It was a beautiful blue sky day when Rudy visited Inverkip so we headed straight to the beach. It’s a short downhill walk from the train station to the village Main Street and then about 100 yards to a footbridge that crosses over the busy A78 road. Another bridge then took us across the Kip Water.

There are paths from here through the middle of the Ardgowan Estate woodlands which can take you past the castle & formal gardens but we chose to walk around the Kip Marina to the start of the coastal path.

There’s a good bit of sandy beach behind the Kip Marina with views out over the Firth of Clyde. The mountain ridge of the Isle of Arran can be seen over the much flatter Isle of Bute with the old Inverkip power station site in the far foreground. The beach is made up of low sandy dunes at the back and a more rocky shoreline. We visited on a very quiet school day so it may not be as peaceful on sunny days at weekends or holidays.

The coastal path which starts here also serves as a woodland walk for a short while with the trees reaching almost right down to the shoreline. It was possible to walk along the shore itself but as the Firth is tidal that may not always be an option. The path is wide and well maintained making for a very easy walk.

Then for even more variety the path heads past a couple of fields where Rudy got to get up close with some sheep. Despite there being lots of lambs in the field all the ewes seemed very calm and not at all worried by us or the other dogs walking so close. We guess that means they must have full confidence in the fence separating them from passersby and that they are used to dogs being kept under close control for this part of their walk.

A little further along is Lunderston Bay itself. This is a definite tourist destination with a big carpark, a coffee & ice cream van and lots of picnic tables and benches on the grass area behind the beach. It’s a perfect spot to visit for a picnic and we had planned to sit and enjoy a long lazy lunch here.

We ended up exploring the beach at Lunderston Bay for so long, investigating the rock pools, looking for shells and investigating all the seaweed and things washed ashore that we decided just to head back to Inverkip and picnic nearer to the train station. We spent four hours exploring along the coast here despite only covering about 6 miles on the walk there & back.

There is a toilet block at Lunderston Bay but when we visited it was closed without notice. We’re not sure why but if you rely on facilities being open there is a nearby garden centre that may allow access for those who need.