Spurn Head is the promontory guarding the mouth of the River Humber.

It is included in this series as it could prove to be a very useful passage Anchorage if trying to make your way North and beset by contrary winds.

The Anchorage provides good shelter with winds from the north-east, North and possibly NNW. It can be a bit exposed however if the wind pipes up from other directions.

It could provide a temporary Anchorage while you await a suitable rise of tide to enter the Marina at Grimsby.

Although the powerful tides roar around Spurn Head at speeds of over 4 kn on the ebb during springs, the Anchorage is outside the mainstream.

There is little or nothing in the way of facilities, but it could save the Mariner pushing into the Humber and thus save time if on passage.

Any kind of approach to the River Humber needs a good study of the charts......

.... to understand the various well buoyed shipping lanes in the approaches. The small craft Mariner, even at low water can keep out of and skirt the edges of these lanes.

Plilotage directions for entering the Humber..

Once safely past Spurn Head you will see various moorings and the jetty.....

..... tuck in and find your anchorage, there is still (2019) a yellow, small craft mooring buoy available. Keep well clear of all official operations.

Thanks are due to those who have made suggestions below about this anchorage - use these and your own judgement remembering that, if you are arriving here at the end of the flood with the intention of leaving at the beginning of the next one, there can be as much as 6m range at Spring tides. You don't want to wake up and find you have to wait until you float to make a dash for Hull. 

The Anchorage lies due West of the pilot jetty, and the two disused lighthouses shown clearly on the chart and in the photos form a useful transit. Anchoring to the North of this transit line could mean touching the bottom at LWS.

There is however quite a large area where you can anchor in over 2 m at CD. Tidal streams in this area are negligible.

If the wind is in the NW it's possible to move up the Humber a bit and find protection  close to the north bank near Hawkins Point. This is the only area on the Lower Humber where any protection can be gained from north-westerly winds.  This is shown on the larger chart.

There are no facilities available here to speak of, the nearest being about 5 miles away. It is easy enough to get ashore, the only inhabitants being paid staff of the lifeboat service. Humber VTS has it's control tower here too.

The area does gets plenty of day visitors by car in nice weather.

Spurn Point (or Spurn Head as it is also known) is a narrow sand spit on the tip of the coast of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England that reaches into the North Sea and forms the north bank of the mouth of the Humber estuary. It is over 3 miles (4.8 km) long, almost half the width of the estuary at that point, and as little as 50 yards (46 m) wide in places. The southernmost tip is known as Spurn Head or Spurn Point and is the home to an RNLI lifeboat station and disused lighthouse. It forms part of the civil parish of Easington.

Spurn Head covers 113 hectares (1.13 km2) above high water and 181 hectares (1.81 km2) of foreshore. It has been owned since 1960 by the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust and is a designated National Nature Reserve, Heritage Coast and is part of the Humber Flats, Marshes and Coast Special Protection Area.

History

In the Middle Ages, Spurn Head was home to the port of Ravenspurn (aka Ravenspur or Ravensburgh), which was the site of Edward IV's landing on March 14, 1471, when he returned from his six months' exile in the Netherlands. An earlier village, closer to the point of Spurn Head, was Ravenser Odd. Along with many other villages on the Holderness coast, Ravenspurn and Ravenser Odd were lost to the encroachments of the sea, as Spurn Head, due to erosion and deposition of its sand, migrated westward.

The lifeboat station at Spurn Head was built in 1810. Owing to the remote location, houses for the lifeboat crew and their families were added a few years later. The station is now the only one in the UK which has full-time paid staff.
Spurn Head from the air in 1979

In World War I two coastal artillery 9.2-inch (230 mm) batteries were added at either end of Spurn Head, with 4-inch (100 mm) and 4.7-inch (120 mm) quick firing guns in between. The emplacements can be clearly seen, and the northern ones are particularly interesting as coastal erosion has partly toppled them onto the beach, revealing the size of the concrete foundations very well. The Information Centre has a leaflet describing the defences.

As well as a road, the peninsula also used to have a railway, parts of which can still be seen. Unusual 'sail bogies' were used as well as more conventional light railway equipment.

Geography

The peninsula is made up from sand and shingle eroded from the Holderness coastline washed down the coastline from Flamborough Head. Material is washed down the coast by longshore drift and accumulates to form the long, narrow embankment in the sheltered waters inside the mouth of the Humber estuary. It is maintained by plants, especially Marram grass (Ammophila arenaria). Waves carry material along the peninsula to the tip, continually extending it; as this action stretches the peninsula it also narrows it to the extent that the sea can cut across it in severe weather. When the sea cuts across it permanently, everything beyond the breach is swept away, only to eventually reform as a new spit pointing further south. This cycle of destruction and reconstruction occurs approximately every 250 years.

The second of the Six Studies in English Folk Song for Cello composed in 1926 by Ralph Vaughan Williams, the Andante sostenuto in E flat "Spurn Point" celebrates this peninsula.

It was featured on the television programme Seven Natural Wonders as one of the wonders of Yorkshire.

Ecology

The mud flats are an important feeding ground for wading birds, and the area has a bird observatory, for monitoring migrating birds and providing accommodation to visiting birdwatchers. Their migration is assisted by east winds in autumn, resulting in drift migration of Scandinavian migrants, sometimes leading to a spectacular "fall" of thousands of birds. Many uncommon species have been sighted there, including a Cliff Swallow from North America, a Lanceolated Warbler from Siberia and a Black-browed Albatross from the Southern Ocean. More commonly, birds such as Wheatears, Whinchats, Common Redstarts and flycatchers alight at Spurn on their way between breeding and wintering grounds elsewhere. When the wind is in the right direction migrants are funnelled down Spurn Point and are counted at the Narrows Watchpoint, more than 15000 birds can fly past on a good morning in autumn with 3000 quite normal.

The text on this HISTORY page is covered by the following licence
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License

There used to be a small cafe established in a large caravan on the site, so you may well be able to stretch your legs and get a bite to eat but local information indicates that this facility has been discontinued - please let us know if it starts up again.