Can you land on Puffin Island?

No — boats do not land on the island itself, because it is a protected reserve. They get close enough for a proper look, with commentary along the way pointing out what you're seeing.

Boat Trips & the Strait

Updated September 2026

Beaumaris has always faced the water rather than the land. The Menai Strait shaped the town's fortunes long before tourism did — as a safe anchorage between Liverpool, Dublin, and the Isle of Man — and it still shapes a day here now, just for different reasons. Stand on the pier for ten minutes and you'll see most of it: a fishing boat heading out, a yacht tacking across the channel, and somewhere out past the headland, Puffin Island waiting.

Puffin Island

A short boat ride from the pier, Puffin Island (Ynys Seiriol in Welsh) sits at the mouth of the Strait, where it opens into the Irish Sea. Once home to a monastery — the ruins are still visible from the water — it's now a protected bird sanctuary, home to around a third of Wales's entire cormorant population alongside guillemots, shags, and, in season, the puffins it's named for. Puffin breeding season runs roughly April to July, so that's the best window to see them; seals haul out on the rocks year-round, and dolphins or porpoises turn up often enough that most trips see something. Boats don't land on the island itself — it's a protected reserve — but they get close enough for a proper look, with commentary along the way pointing out what you're seeing.

Seacoast Safaris, based right by the pier, runs the trip regularly through the season, along with a combined route that also takes in the Menai Strait's bridges in one outing.

The Swellies and the two bridges

Heading the other direction from the pier, boat trips run down the Strait through the Swellies — a notoriously tricky stretch of tidal water squeezed between rocks, where the tide can run at several knots and has claimed ships over the centuries. It sits directly beneath the Menai Suspension Bridge, Thomas Telford's 1826 crossing, and the Britannia Bridge alongside it — seeing both from the water, rather than driving over them, is a genuinely different way to take them in. Most heritage-focused cruises take in Plas Newydd, the historic house on the Strait's banks, along the way too.

The Britannia Bridge seen from below, rising over the Menai Strait

Beaumaris Pier with the RNLI lifeboat station and lifeboat on the water

The pier and the lifeboat

Beaumaris Pier is where most of this starts — a working landing point as much as a place to stroll or crab off the side, much as it's done since Victorian pleasure steamers first called here. The Beaumaris RNLI lifeboat station sits right beside it, home to an Atlantic 85 inshore lifeboat and staffed entirely by volunteers, part of a rescue service the town has supported for over a century. It's not a visitor attraction in the conventional sense, but it's a genuine working part of the town — the crew are on call whether or not anyone's watching, and the station's shop is worth a look if you want to support them directly.

Sailing

The Strait's sheltered water has made Beaumaris a sailing town for generations. Royal Anglesey Yacht Club, based here, is one of the oldest sailing clubs in Wales, and its presence shapes the town's calendar — regattas and racing through the summer bring the water off the pier to life with boats of every size. Even if you're not sailing yourself, a clear afternoon on the front usually means watching a fair amount of it happen.

Aerial view of boats leaving the harbour into open water

Common questions

Can you land on Puffin Island?: No — boats do not land on the island itself, because it is a protected reserve. They get close enough for a proper look, with commentary along the way pointing out what you're seeing.
When is the best time to see puffins at Puffin Island?: The puffin breeding season runs roughly April to July, so that's the best window to see them. Seals haul out on the rocks year-round, and dolphins or porpoises turn up often enough that most trips see something.
What are the Swellies?: A notoriously tricky stretch of tidal water squeezed between rocks, where the tide can run at several knots and has claimed ships over the centuries. It sits directly beneath the Menai Suspension Bridge — Thomas Telford's 1826 crossing — and the Britannia Bridge alongside it.
Who runs boat trips from Beaumaris?: Seacoast Safaris, based right by the pier, runs the Puffin Island trip regularly through the season, along with a combined route that also takes in the Menai Strait's bridges in one outing.
What is the RNLI station at Beaumaris Pier?: The Beaumaris RNLI lifeboat station sits right beside the pier, home to an Atlantic 85 inshore lifeboat and staffed entirely by volunteers — part of a rescue service the town has supported for over a century. The station's shop is worth a look if you want to support them directly.