Benone Strand and Magilligan
Surf beach · Salt water · in The Causeway and Antrim coast
Seven miles of clean firm sand running from Magilligan Point at the mouth of Lough Foyle east to Downhill, backed by a large dune system beneath the basalt scarp of Binevenagh. The council describes the sand as without rock, shingle or weed, and it is level enough along most of its length to be driven on.
Safety: cold water shock — can cause serious injury or death. 2 more points apply here.
FishingHQ describes what this place is, not whether you may fish it. Access, permits and who to ask.
What you can catch here
Documented at this place, grouped by how you would be fishing, with how strongly the sources support each one. This is what has been written down, not a forecast, and being listed is never permission to fish.
From the shore · 3
What these strengths mean
- Characteristic of this water
- This water is strongly identified with this species by the sources that cover it.
- Seasonal
- Well supported, and concentrated in part of the year rather than spread through it.
- Places, accounts and sources are counted separately
- A fish documented once at each of six marks is still documented once at each of six marks. Breadth is reported as a place count and never raises the strength, and sources are deduplicated across places so one publisher covering a whole coast counts as one. A fishery account is a source describing the fishing; a recorded catch is a report of a specific catch. They are counted apart because they are not the same evidence.
Fish documented nearby, not here
Nothing below has been documented at Benone Strand and Magilligan itself. Each one has been documented at a named place on the same ground, and the places are listed with it. Treat this as what the water around here holds rather than as a catch list for this mark.
Widely documented on this ground
Documented at three or more neighbouring places, fished a way this place is also fished. That is a pattern about the ground rather than about any one mark, and it is the closest this site comes to saying you will probably meet a fish somewhere nothing has been written about.
From the shore
- Ballan wrasse — documented at Portrush and Ramore Head; Ballintoy; Rathlin Island and the Sound (+3 more)
- Pollack — documented at Portrush and Ramore Head; Rathlin Island and the Sound; Portballintrae (+3 more)
- Saithe — documented at Portballintrae; Ballycastle; Cushendun and Torr Head (+2 more)
- Atlantic cod — documented at Portrush and Ramore Head; Waterfoot and Red Bay; Ballintoy
- Conger eel — documented at Portrush and Ramore Head; Rathlin Island and the Sound; Dunseverick
- Atlantic mackerel — documented at Portrush and Ramore Head; Rathlin Island and the Sound; Portballintrae (+4 more)
- Turbot — documented at Ballycastle; Ballintoy; White Park Bay
Also documented at neighbouring places
One or two accounts each, on the ground around here. Enough to know the fish is caught in these waters; not enough to say anything about this place.
From the shore
- Bull huss — documented at Ballycastle; Cushendun and Torr Head
- Dab — documented at Ballycastle; Ballintoy
- Brown trout — documented at The Bann mouth at Castlerock
- European plaice — documented at Ballintoy
- Thick-lipped grey mullet — documented at Portstewart Strand; The Bann mouth at Castlerock
- Whiting — documented at Portstewart Strand; Waterfoot and Red Bay
How people fish it
Practised here: Sea fishing.
Methods the sources name for this ground. Each one is explained in full on its own page.
- Ledgering
Fishing a bait on the bottom held by a weight, with no float — the simplest way to fish at distance, in depth, or in wind.
- Kayak fishing
A platform rather than a technique: quiet, shallow-draught access to water no other craft reaches, bought at the price of exposure, and a discipline where the decision not to launch is part of the skill.
The ground and the water
- The ground
- Seven miles of clean firm sand running from Magilligan Point at the mouth of Lough Foyle east to Downhill, backed by a large dune system beneath the basalt scarp of Binevenagh. The council describes the sand as without rock, shingle or weed, and it is level enough along most of its length to be driven on.
- Exposure
- Open north and north-west to the full Atlantic fetch. This is a surf beach in the proper sense and the shore directory says it fishes well in a good surf rather than in spite of one.
- Depth
- Shallow and evenly graded for a long way out, with the gutters and bars that a seven-mile surf beach forms and reforms.
- Tide and flow
- A long shallow gradient over which the tide moves a great distance, and the beach is parked on, which makes the flood a fact about the car as much as about the fishing.
Getting there
What public sources describe, last checked 2026-08-25. Car parks fill, services change and a path existing is not a path anybody may use — none of this is a guarantee of availability and none of it is permission to be anywhere.
- Getting to it
- Seven miles of firm sand off the A2 about twelve miles north of Limavady, well signposted, and one of the few beaches in Northern Ireland that is driven on rather than walked onto. The shore directory says plainly that it is fishable from the boot of a car, which is the practical fact that distinguishes it from every other surf beach on this coast.
- The walk in
- Effectively none where the beach is open to vehicles: the car goes to the sand. Where it is not, the entrance car park puts the water within a short level walk across firm ground.
- Tidal access
- Vehicles are parked on the sand, so the tide governs getting out as much as getting on. A seven-mile beach with a shallow gradient moves a long way on the flood, and the tide table is the thing to read before driving down rather than after.
- Mobility
- The council describes Benone as Northern Ireland's first fully inclusive beach, with accessible toilets and disabled parking, and specialist beach access equipment for people with limited mobility available in July and August by prior booking through a named charity rather than on arrival.
Parking
Benone Strand beach and entrance parking
Public car park · No charge recorded
The council provides free parking both at the beach entrance and on the beach itself. On-beach parking depends on the sand being firm and on the tide, and neither this record nor the council promises a space.
Where this access information comes from
- Benone Strand — Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council tourism service — Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council (Local authority, harbour or protected-area body)Relied on for: The council's own statement that free parking is provided at the entrance and on the beach, that accessible toilets and disabled parking are provided, that beach access equipment is bookable in July and August, that an RNLI lifeguard service runs in July and August, and that fishing is among the activities on the beach.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- Sea Angling in Ireland: the shore marks of Londonderry — Sea Angling Ireland (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: That the beach is driveable, well signposted and fishable from the boot of a car.States this directlyPassage read and verified
What is there
Public toilets
Accessible toilets at the beach, with further provision at Downhill Strand and within the Benone tourist complex.
Food or shelter
A coffee dock in the Ark building at the beach. Seasonal in practice, and the council does not publish hours this record could rely on.
Step-free access to the water's edge
Driving onto firm sand puts a car at the water's edge, and the council provides disabled parking and bookable beach access equipment in the summer months.
Public rescue equipment recorded
An RNLI beach lifeguard service operates in July and August only, ten until six. For the rest of the year, and outside those hours, there is none.
Through the year
Flounder is the mainstay through the year and a club runs a Sunday competition here in winter. Bass and dogfish are given at night in calm conditions, which is the reverse of the usual bass-in-a-surf rule and is recorded as the source gives it. The national federation fishes a shore-league match here on the first of November — the only one of its four venues fished in daylight rather than after dark.
The months the sources attach to each species here. Where a species carries no season it is listed underneath rather than assumed to run through the year.
| Species | J | F | M | A | M | J | J | A | S | O | N | D |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| European sea bass — seasonal, recorded in June, July, August, September, October. | ||||||||||||
| Small-spotted catshark — seasonal, recorded in June, July, August, September, October. |
Recorded here with no season stated: European flounder.
Safety
Cold water shock — Can cause serious injury or death
UK coastal and inland water is cold enough for most of the year to trigger the involuntary gasp and the loss of swimming ability that decides most immersion deaths, and it does so within the first minute, long before hypothermia is relevant.
What reduces it: Wear a buoyancy aid rather than carry one, carry a means of calling for help on the person rather than in a bag, and plan on the assumption that an unplanned entry into the water is survivable only if somebody knows immediately.
Cliffs and rock platforms — Can cause serious injury or death
Basalt ledges put an angler over deep water with vertical kelp-covered rock behind. Swell arrives in sets, including Atlantic ground swell independent of local wind, and a person swept off has no shallow margin and nothing to climb.
What reduces it: Watch a mark through several full set cycles from above the wet line before committing, choose a platform with a way up behind it, wear a buoyancy aid on the rocks, and do not fish exposed rock alone.
Moving water and currents — Can cause injury needing treatment
A long shallow surf beach with a large tidal excursion sets up rips through the bars and gutters, and the water that is knee-deep on the walk out is not the water that is there on the walk back.
What reduces it: Fish from the beach rather than from a bar, set a leaving time from the tide table before wading anywhere, and treat a channel filling behind you as the signal to go rather than as a nuisance.
Rules and access
FishingHQ does not know the current access position here. Sea angling access in Northern Ireland is governed by landowner permission, harbour and council byelaws, and fisheries and conservation measures, all of which change. Check the current position with the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, the harbour or council, and the landowner before going.
Particular to this water: A live military range adjoins part of this shore and is signalled by flags and by published firing times. Whether any given stretch may be entered on any given day is the range authority's to answer and nobody else's, and it changes daily. This ground carries conservation designations that constrain access, vehicles, bait collection and disturbance independently of any fishing rule.
Who holds the answer:
- The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, for sea fisheries and marine conservation in Northern Ireland.
- The harbour authority or council, for access to the structure or the shore.
- The Northern Ireland department responsible for agriculture, environment and rural affairs, which administers sea fisheries measures and marine conservation here.
- The Loughs Agency, the cross-border body administering the Foyle and Carlingford systems, whose licensing arrangements differ from the rest of Northern Ireland.
- The Northern Ireland Environment Agency and the site management bodies, where a coastal, geological or World Heritage designation affects access or activity.
- The National Trust or other landowner, where access to the shore crosses land in their ownership.
- The harbour authority at each port, for access to and fishing from harbour structures.
Nearby fishing
Other publicly documented places within about 40 km, by distance. Positions are approximate public geography and are never exact marks.
- The Bann mouth at Castlerock — 5–10 km · Estuary
- The Roe estuary — 5–10 km · Estuary
- Portstewart Strand — 5–10 km · Beach
- Portrush and Ramore Head — 10–25 km · Headland
- Portballintrae — 10–25 km · Bay
- The River Bush — 25–40 km · River reach
- Dunseverick — 25–40 km · Rock mark
- White Park Bay — 25–40 km · Beach
Sources for this place
- JNCC species and habitat conservation advice — Joint Nature Conservation Committee (Conservation authority)Relied on for: Description, designation and habitat characterisation of the named coastal and marine features of the United Kingdom, and the species characteristically associated with them.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Cefas science, advice and data on marine and freshwater environments — Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (Government fisheries body)Relied on for: Marine environmental science for UK shelf seas: sediment characterisation, estuarine process, shellfish bed distribution, tidal range and the monitoring that describes them.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Long-running published description of British sea angling practice by region, ground type and named mark.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated public descriptions of which places are conventionally fished and how, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as scholarship, and not relied on for access, permission or any current rule.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Sea Angling in Ireland: the shore marks of Londonderry — Sea Angling Ireland (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: A shore-mark directory describing this mark's ground, species, baits and access character.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- NIFSA competition venues, dates and species leagues — Northern Ireland Federation of Sea Anglers (Angling or fisheries organisation)Relied on for: The national federation scheduling a shore-league match at this venue on a named date and at a named time of day.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- Public fishing video with an explicitly stated location — Various public video platforms (Practitioner report)Relied on for: A dated public video whose uploader names this ground and shows it being fished from a kayak, without naming a species.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy. Last reviewed 2026-08-16.