AIBU parking in Cornwall

[SeamusMacDubh]

Hi Mumsnetters, hoping some of you will know the answer to help me out!

I’m in Cornwall for the week with my DC, planning on visiting different beaches while we’re here, probably for the whole day (0900-1600). Where can I park without paying through the nose? All of the day parking is £8-£9 a day, I was hoping for half of that or if possible free on street parking?!

I don’t mind walking about a mile... tomorrow I was hoping to go to Gylly beach, will be going to Porth, Fistral bay and any others than you can suggest!!

Would it not be cheaper to take public transport or even a taxi?

Cornwall lies on a long peninsula with no inland area more than 20 miles from the sea. It has a coastline of over 400 miles with 158 miles designated as Heritage Coast.

Want to be more specific ?

The residential streets around the beaches are often free. Just use satnav to go a couple of streets away.

Not much use to you this hol unless you are a member already but for the future some beach parking is National Trust and free for members with the badge.

Gylly and fistral are quite specific @iasktoomanyquestions

To me £8-9/day parking is a snip. It £15+ per day near where I live.

There are off road parking areas but you need to look around and probably have a scout around the night before you want to go somewhere.

Might be worth your while looking at the rent my drive type websites, but I’m imagining that the prices will be more than the car parks.

Thank you for the replies, we’ll be up and out early and in no rush so I’ll have a look around the street parking.

@SunniDay we are national trust members! I have my sticker in my car but I’ve forgotten my card 🤦🏻‍♀️ I’ll have a look and see if there are any car parks useful to us, thanks.

Harlyn Bay is £5 a day, it's just outside of St Merryn near Padstow. If you can get there before 8-ish you may even beat the carpark man

We get the train a lot. Falmouth and st ives in particular. National trust car parks a great idea.

To be honest, there's no way of avoiding it at this time of year. Our visitors got a ticket last week for attempting to park outside the usual bay when the entire car park was full.

Carlyon bay is £2 per day. Fab food down there too.

Try Constantine near padstow. Fab beach and the car park is 5 a day or you can park in the village and walk about half a mile to the beach.

Also second Harlyn, though we prefer Constantine!

£9 a day for a whole day seems cheap to me.

Argh. I feel your pain. I am local and I begrudge spending so much on parking when I can go for free in the winter.

Mawgan Porth ranges from £4-£5 for the day I think. Depends on the weather and how busy. A lady collects money in a hut rather than the machine. I think you can pay at Watergate in one of the car parks up the hill for a whole day too!

Porth is a pound an hour in the car park by the caravan park.

Not sure on other places at the top of my head.

Visited Polzeath recently. Was only stopping for less than an hour to get an ice cream with the kids. No option to pay for an hour at the beach car park. Had to pay for 2 hours minimum at £3.50 odd. I was annoyed all day!

You can find prices for council ran car parks on Cornwall council website (use google to find) but not sure on how to find out for private car parks!

NT won't let you park free unless you have your card, they've been scammed too often apparently.

Also people who park on streets to avoid parking charges need to be careful where they park. I completely understand why you do it but don’t park outside peoples houses because it might mean locals have to park miles away from their home. I know people don’t own the public road space outside their homes but my elderly grandparents can never park outside their home due to people doing this. Also make sure you leave plenty of room for other road users. I’ve seen some terrible parking here. A lot of streets close by to beaches our double yellow lined to stop people doing this anyway!

Harlyn Bay is amazing and well worth the £5 a day parking. Carbis Bay is also lovely and had its own train station. I think it was about £10 to park there for the day but well worth it as it's like being in the Caribbean

Daymer Bay near Rock is around £6 for a whole day... get there early though

NT now have fancy parking meters that scan your membership card, so possibly not much luck without your card. Maybe they're able to email you a temporary card though, maybe worth calling them?

Look on www.parkopedia.co.uk - prices and locations.

Thank you so much for these tips and ideas! £5 is much easier to stomach than £9 - I know some will think IABU but it soon adds up if we go to the beach 5 days! I’ll be ploughing the saved £4 into local businesses no doubt.

I live near Fistral and honestly the people living here would love to park outside our houses. Please do use car parks when coming for the day
I totally agree they are overpriced tho, generally we all lock off at that but not much changes apart from increases 😕

Try Godrevy it’s beautiful and free parking for national trust members

For Gylly you can park along the sea front by Castle Beach for free all day. It’s a 5 min walk if you could just stay at Castle if the tides are right.

Check out Brittany or west coast of Ireland. Gorgeous beaches, free parking and plenty of it.

I meant we all *kick off at parking prices. Autocorrect strikes again