_What's on the East Coast in East Anglia

The East Coast of East Anglia has 130 miles of shoreline, including huge stretches of sandy beach, soaring cliffs, shingle spits, salt marshes, dunes and estuaries that are a haven for wildlife and a delight for visitors. Where will you explore on the East Coast?

We begin our guide to the East Coast of East Anglia at the southern extreme at Felixstowe and head north before going west to The Wash, the biggest estuarial water in the British Isles.

Suffolk

Felixstowe is a charming unspoilt seaside town that has the lasting legacy of Victorian times – a classic pier and extensive promenade and gardens. Landguard Fort, now a museum, overlooks the Orwell and Stour estuaries. It was the site of the last opposed seaborne invasion of England, by the Dutch in 1667 – they were repulsed by the Royal Marines in their first land battle.

There are cafes and pubs at Felixstowe Ferry which has a foot ferry across the River Deben to Bawdsey. Upriver is waterside Woodbridge and Anglo-Saxon Sutton Hoo.

At 10 miles long (16km), Orford Ness is the longest shingle spit in the British Isles. An internationally important coastal nature reserve run by the National Trust, it was home to early radar development that helped win the Battle of Britain.

Seasonal boat trips are available across the River Alde from Orford, a lovely riverside village with a 12th century castle and reputation for cured fish.

Orford Ness starts at Aldeburgh, where fishermen still take their boats off the shingle beach for the daily catch. See what’s selling at the weather-worn shacks. Aldeburgh is as charming a seaside town as you’ll come across, with a High Street of superb pubs, restaurants, chic shops and galleries. Visitors and locals queue at the fish and chip shops, they’re that good.

Aldeburgh has the region’s best food and drink festival and an internationally-renowned classical music festival, initiated by Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears. Visit their home – the Red House. Both festivals are hosted at Snape Maltings.

Head past Maggi Hamblin’s Scallop sculpture on the beach to Thorpeness, a mock Tudor holiday resort that was inspired by Peter Pan. Take a rowing boat out on The Meare to a picnic island and see The House In The Clouds and windmill.

RSPB Minsmere is one of the most important wildlife reserves in the UK. Walk from here across the heathland, past the Coastguard Cottages with its tearoom, to Dunwich, now a single street village but once one of the biggest and most prosperous ports in the country.

A short walk on boardwalks across marshes by the River Dunwich will take you to Walberswick, a picturesque village with a sandy beach. There is a seasonal row boat ferry and bridge across the River Blyth to characterful Blackshore Harbour which has a row of shabby chic cafes and fish shacks.

Southwold is a set-in-aspic seaside town largely unchanged since the 1950s, with quirky amusements on the Victorian pier, charming High Street of pubs, boutiques and independent shops, iconic lighthouse and long sandy beach.

The final stretch of Suffolk coast is sandy beach stretching from Kessingland to Pakefield, Lowestoft and Corton. A traditional seaside resort with amusements and promenade at the most easterly point of the British Isles, Lowestoft and its harbour also has a rich fishing heritage.

Norfolk

There are holiday parks at Corton and Hopton before the beach reaches the River Yare at Gorleston-on-Sea which has a large sandy beach, clifftop promenade with sports facilities and typical seaside shops. Across the river is Great Yarmouth, the most popular seaside resort on the east coast with its Golden Mile of amusements, ride, eateries and attractions including The Hippodrome with its water spectacular, The Pleasure Beach and Britannia Pier.

To the north is an unbroken stretch of sandy beach taking in Caister-on-Sea, California, Scratby, Newport and Hemsby.

Winterton-on-Sea has a sandy beach, eateries and one of the best dune networks in the region. In the winter they provide a good vantage point to see the seal colony. Look out for the African thatched roundhouses at Hermanus.

From here there is a stretch of beach backed by dunes and sea defences but few amenities. This includes Horsey Gap, Waxham, Sea Palling where the defences have created crescent-shaped bays, Eccles-on-Sea and Cart Gap. It was here in 1953 that the North Sea broke through and flooded this part of the Broads National Park.

Happisburgh, with its red and white striped lighthouse, has suffered coastal erosion which has revealed prehistoric finds including the oldest human footprints outside Africa’s Great Rift Valley.

Leading to Cromer on the north-east corner of the Norfolk coast, there are beaches at Walcott, Bacton, Mundesley and Overstrand.

Cromer is a popular seaside town with the world’s last end-of-pier theatre, clifftop promenade, beach that’s becoming popular with surfers and is home to the eponymous crab which feeds on the offshore chalk reef, the longest in the world. Beneath the cliffs of the Cromer Ridge, East Runton and West Runton are favourite spots for rockpooling, and Sheringham is an unspoilt seaside town that’s home to The Poppy Line heritage steam railway and Sheringham Park, with unrivalled views along the coast.

The cliffs now descend to shingle beach at Weybourne and Salthouse before turning to saltmarsh that’s home to Cley Marshes Nature Reserve, one of the best birdspotting locations in the region. Cley-next-the-Sea village, with its iconic windmill, is a charming spot to linger.

The coastline now gets wilder, with the four-mile long Blakeney Spit spit creating a large estuary over the River Glaven that protects the marsh. Blakeney is a picturesque riverside village, there are boat trips to see the seal colony at Blakeney Point from Morston Quay, and Stiffkey’s saltmarshes give us the ‘Stewkey Blue’ cockle.

Wells-next-the-Sea and Holkham share one of the most impressive stretches of beach in the UK. At low tide you can walk a mile to find the seashore. Wells-next-the-Sea is now a characterful riverside port, renowned for its harbour crabbing. The beach, with its famous line of multi-coloured beach huts, is backed by a man-made pine forest that protects the coast, part of a National Nature Reserve.

No less impressive a beach is at Brancaster, on the other side of Scolt Head National Nature Reserve, an island that preserves a large area of tidal saltmarsh in which there are the waterside villages of Burnham Overy Staithe and Brancaster Staithe.

The next stretch of coast combines beach and wetlands, with superb birdspotting at Titchwell, Thornham and Holme-next-the-Sea, before turning south to Old Hunstanton and Hunstanton, a seaside resort nicknamed ‘Sunny Hunny’. Don’t miss the multi-coloured cliffs and glorious sunset – this is the only west-facing resort on the east coast.

The final stretch of the east coast in East Anglia to the River Great Ouse that separates Norfolk from Lincolnshire takes in The Wash, the largest estuarial system in the British Isles. There is a beach at Heacham before more tidal saltmarshes and creeks at Snettisham create a safe environment for thousands of wading birds and migrating geese.