Rockfall seals the ancient Holy Well cave at Holywell Bay

A rockfall on a scale rarely seen on this stretch of coast has closed off one of Cornwall’s oldest and strangest holy sites. The sea cave holding the Holy Well at Holywell Bay, tucked into the cliffs at the northern end of the beach and reachable only at low tide, is now buried behind a slope of collapsed slate, and the volunteers who know this coastline best are warning that the ground around it is still moving.

What happened overnight into Sunday

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

Newquay Coastguard Search and Rescue Team said the fall came down overnight into Sunday 30 August, sealing off the cave entrance completely. The team’s own words were blunt. “Sadly overnight a substantial rock fall has sealed off the cave to Holy Well on Holywell Beach,” they wrote, adding that the area remains unstable and should be avoided.

Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club, whose members photographed the aftermath, described the scene as devastating. “We are deeply saddened that our Holy well is no longer accessible,” the club said. “A massive overnight rockfall has completely devastated the area.”

A holy well hidden inside a sea cave

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

The Holy Well sits inside what locals know as St Cuthbert’s Cave, at the far end of Holywell Bay beach near Newquay, and it is one of two holy wells in the parish of Cubert. Fresh water seeping down through the rock built up over centuries into a series of terraced pools, each one holding its own still puddle, with the walls stained in bands of white, red, green and purple by the minerals in the water. It could only ever be reached at low tide, when the sand cleared enough to walk in, which was part of what made finding it feel like a discovery even for people who had heard about it for years.

A legend a thousand years old

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

The story behind the well stretches back over a thousand years. One version holds that in 995AD, monks fleeing Lindisfarne with the remains of St Cuthbert were blown off course and came ashore in Cornwall, and that where his bones touched the spring water in the cave, the water was left with healing properties. A second telling ties the name to St Cubert, a Welsh missionary said to have preached in the area in the 700s. Whichever version people believed, the effect was the same. For generations, people travelled from far beyond Cornwall to the cave hoping the water might cure ailments, and mothers in particular were said to have carried sick children to it in search of a cure.

Why the cliffs remain dangerous

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

Newquay Coastguard’s warning goes beyond the cave itself. Heavy rain arriving after a prolonged dry spell, the team said, can leave the ground along the coast path more likely to give way, and further incidents are possible. Walkers are being told to keep well back from the edge along the clifftops, and to stay clear of the base of the cliffs too, rather than risk what is above the sand as well as what is below it.

What to do if you see someone in difficulty

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

If anyone is spotted in trouble along the coast, the advice from the coastguard is straightforward. Dial 999 and ask for the coastguard.

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club

📷Credit: Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club