Cafes at the coast – The Extra Mile

Sea saunas in the UK are popping up all over the place: hoorah for sea saunas! They’re great for surfers, sea swimmers, and those who like to stay firmly on shore. Invigorate your senses and boost your wellbeing with a trip to a seaside of coastal sauna: the UK’s hottest trend. It’s perhaps no coincidence that the Finns, inventors of the sauna, are consistently voted the world’s happiest nation…

If you know some who loves a sea sauna after wild swimming, they’ll love our best-selling foodie travel book, The Coastal Café Guide. Take a look and perhaps buy a copy now for their next birthday. They might repay you with a voucher for a sea sauna…

With sea dipping also on the rise, boasting an impressive list of health and wellbeing benefits too, sea saunas are seeing a significant rise in popularity. What better way to warm up after a dip in the surf?

Here are a few of our favourite sea saunas. Grab your cozzies and go get some yourself some Vitamin Sea.

Sea Scrub: the sea sauna in Margate

The first commercial Saunum Cube Sauna in the UK. With bluetooth speakers and adjustable lighting, the Sea Scrub sauna is the best place to enjoy the stunning views of the Margate coast line. Offering private or social sessions, depending on your preference.

Visit Sea Scrub Sauna in Margate

Sea Biscuit: a sea sauna in Aberdeen

Calling sea-swimmers in Scotland (or those who like to stay warm and on shore): here’s your ideal wood-fired horsebox sauna at Aberdeen Beach. Take five friends along to soak up views of the North Sea. Treat yourself to a Sauna Spa Platter with face mask, body scrub, fruit platter, ‘Nosecco’ (booze and saunas don’t mix, kids), flannels, and scented oil for water.

Visit Sea Biscuit Sauna, Aberdeen

For a sea sauna in Worthing: head to Fire Salt Sea

An authentic wood-fired sea sauna on the beach in Worthing with a 200kg wood-fired Estonian stove and Finnish olivine rocks. Enjoy unbroken views out to sea through the full width window. Prices haven’t been increased since 2020 to keep it affordable for all. Perfect for wild swimmers, morning dippers, and those who just love a sea sauna on the Sussex coast.

Visit Fire Salt Sea

For a sea sauna in Padstow or Polzeath: hit up Saunas by the Sea

Two first-rate North Cornwall beaches, two golden sea saunas: you’ll find Saunas by the Sea in arguably two of the most desirable beach destinations in the UK: Polzeath (one sauna’s in the village centre and one’s hidden in Baby Bay, just along the beach) and Padstow. Cosy up in the wood-fired cabins before a plunge in the sea, or warm up after as you catch some waves in the rightly-famous surf. If you’re looking for a sea sauna in Polzeath or Padstow, look no further. The Wild Spa and Wellness Centre (part of the central Polzeath offering) adds outdoor classes, yoga, workshops, and a cold plunge pool to the sauna experience.

Go to Saunas by the Sea

Seek a sea sauna in Poole? Head to The Salt Water Sauna

The Salt Water Sauna invites you to a Nordic bathing experience. It was set up by Arlene, a Finn living in the UK, who wanted to create an authentic sauna experience. Through Tree Era, for every sauna booked a tree is planted, off-setting the wood used to fire the sauna. Aficionados can also check out their winter wellness retreats, hosted in Helsinki.

Go to The Salt Water Sauna, Poole

Looking for a sea sauna in Dover? You need Rebels Sea Sauna

A café and sauna set below the iconic white cliffs of Dover. More than just a sauna, but a community hub, where you can swing by for a sauna session, Tea and Tarot, or an art exhibition – check out their socials for more info on events.

Visit Rebels Sea Sauna in Dover

Need a sea sauna in Bude? Seek out Ocean Soul Sauna

Set right on Crooklets Beach, you can enjoy the views across the wide sandy beach as you invigorate your senses. If you’re looking for a sea sauna experience in Bude, you have come to the right place. Peer through the half-moon window straight out to sea.

Visit Ocean Soul Sauna, Bude

Looking for a sea sauna in Oxwich Bay, Swansea? Try: Ty Sawna

This was Wales’ first beach sauna. Wood-fired and barrel-shaped, this sea sauna is right next to the sea at Oxwich Bay. Enjoy beautiful views of the ocean through the panoramic half moon window.

Visit Ty Sawna, Oxwich Bay

Need a sea sauna in Portsmouth? Visit Southsea Café

An independent bistro café right on the water’s edge in Eastney, the Southsea Beach Café now has a sea sauna. The sea sauna opened at the beginning of March 2024 with daily sessions bookable on their website. Ladies only sessions are often available and are bookable online, check ahead.

Sea sauna at Southsea Beach Café

Sea Sauna, Saunton

Looking for a This Nordic wood-fired sauna on wheels fits up to 12 comfortably. Set right by the water on the North Devon Coast’s renowned Saunton Sands, it allows you to take in the stunning beach in total privacy (its huge window is tinted).

Visit Sea Sauna

A great gift idea for sea swimmers and surfers, our UK coastal café and food guide makes a great gift. So if you have friends who do like to be beside the seaside (all that surfing and sauna-ing works up an appetite) buy The Coastal Café Guide, a best-selling guide to 150 brilliant cafés on the coast and at the beach.

The ultimate guidebook trio for foodies

If you’re getting ‘gift-giving anxiety’ about what to buy the discerning, book-loving foodie in your life, look no further than this unique foodie present. Our trio of foodie travel guides covers off-motorway cafés, farm shops, and cafés at the coast, with a total of around 600 memorable places top stop. This makes it the ideal gift for road-trip lovers seeking something different, or those seeking dog-friendly and family-friendly cafés and farm shops while on the road. Not only that, they’ll help you avoid motorway services and boring, big-brand food chains, helping you find, support, and enjoy Britain’s wealth of smaller, independent, local food and drinks businesses instead.

Our three British travel guides for foodies are outlined below. Order today and in a few short days, you could be planning your next road trip avoiding the motorway services, sea-view seafood stop-off, or family-friendly farm-shop experience. Low-food-miles and more ethically minded eateries, here you come. And what’s even better? Buy the trio (which we’re dubbing ‘Surf, Turf, and Tarmac’) and you’ll get the three for cheaper even than Amazon – while supporting a small, independent publisher while you’re at it. Win, win, and thrice win!

The Extra Mile Guide: an Amazon #1 travel bestseller in 2023 and 2024

The Extra Mile: Delicious Alternatives to Motorway Services (4th edition.) is packed with independent cafés. It was one of 2023 and indeed 2024’s best-selling and ‘Most Gifted’ travel guides online, and it featured on BBC Breakfast TV, many BBC Radio channels, and elsewhere in print and online. It’s packed with over 275 delicious places to stop and eat just off junctions and near motorway and A-road junctions, to help you avoid motorway services and avoid chain food and find instead the best food stops on your British road trips. Use the foodie guidebook’s handy maps to find local farm shops near you, cosy cafés near motorway junctions, dog-friendly pubs or unusual places to eat just off junctions, while supporting the local, independent food businesses along your route. Covering areas just off motorway and main road junctions in mainland England, Scotland and Wales, it features:

Over 275 places to eat and drink with times, descriptions, images, contact details
11 motorway-based maps to help you find places to eat just off motorways and junctions
Map showing cafés with EV chargers and restaurants with EV chargers

The Coastal Café Guide: a 2024 Amazon #1 Hot New Release

The Coastal Café Guide is the ideal travel and café guide for anyone who loves food, loves the coast, and wants to find cafés on the coast, coffee at the beach, and seafood near the sea! An Amazon No #1 Hot New Release in July 2024, it’s also been featured in The Times Weekend, The Sun, and The Scotsman. It’s the perfect gift for beach lovers, coast-path walkers, surfers, paddle-boarders, seafood fans, water sports enthusiasts, holidaymakers, and those travelling with families and dogs. It’s perfect to help wild swimmers find a post-swim coffee by the sea, too. Inside The Coastal Café Guide, find:

150 cafés, restaurants, beach bars, seafood cabins, and pubs at the coast
Dog-friendly and family-friendly places to eat at the coast, often with a sea view
10 striking regional maps to help you find a café on the coast near you
Independent, smaller cafés and places to eat on the coast
Features on a dozen marine- and coast-relevant charities including (and with a donation per book to) Surfers Against Sewage
Places in England, Scotland and Wales (inc. Isles of Scilly, Isle of Wight, Isle of Man, Isle of Skye)

The Coastal Café Guide also features 12 coastal charities, including the RNLI, the Ramblers, The Marine Conservation Society (MCS), The Marine Stewardship Council (MCS), the Open Seas charity, The John Muir Trust, The Wave Project, the National Trust for Scotland, City to Sea, The Outdoor Swimming Society, and The South West Coast Path Organisation. Not only will you be supporting local food businesses and local communities, you’ll be helping raise the profile (and raising money) for some tireless UK-based charities.

The Farm Shop Guide: as seen in The Times and Waitrose Weekend

This is the ideal food, travel, and farm shop and farm café guide and directory for anyone who loves fresh food, farm-to-fork experiences, and farm-focused events and activities. It became an Amazon #1 bestseller following some fab coverage in The Times Weekend, Waitrose Weekend, The Scotsman, Cotswold Life, and more. If you love farm-fresh food and local flavours and are keen to locate a farm shop, to shop seasonally and avoid flown-in food (while supporting Britain’s farmers and growers), this is the book for you. The Farm Shop Guide will help you find farm-fresh food and independent farm shops and cafés across Britain: perfect places for a weekly shop, an eat-out treat, or a family-friendly or dog-friendly day trip to a farm. In the book you’ll find:

First-rate farm shops, farm shop cafés, and farm restaurants
Farmers’ markets and food festivals
Dog-friendly and family-friendly places to stop, eat and shop
Farm shops with EV chargers for your vehicles
Farms and farm shops offering PYO (pick-your-own) fruit, veg, flowers, Christmas trees, and pumpkin places
Striking full-colour maps and full-page features per farm shop
Spotlights on food, farming, and environmental charities including: Pasture for Life, the Sustainable Food Trust, Buglife, RSPB Fair to Nature, the Permaculture Association, Community Supported Agriculture, and the Soil Association.

For local farm shops, farmers markets, this farm shop directory has all the information you need on Britain’s best farm shops, organic farm shops, artisan food shops, and family-friendly farm experiences.

Buy the ultimate trio of foodie guidebooks today for just £42

If it’s a foodie gift or foodie book you seek, our guidebooks really will put a smile on the most discerning food lover’s face…treat yourself and they’ll have the same effect.

The three guides (either alone or together) make great gifts for gourmets, and those who love to avoid motorway services and big-brand chain food because they prefer farm shops, fresh food, local food, or perhaps food with a view. Our foodie travel guides also make great artisan food gifts for chefs, cooks, and Masterchef fans, who like to go the extra mile themselves when it comes to eating out, entertaining, and cooking.

Support local, smaller food growers, producers and businesses, and easily locate independent cafés and farm shops near you and at the coast, wherever you live and wherever you travel around Britain.

Category: Cafes at the coast

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