Devon, England

Mount Batten put-in (Plymouth)

Launch — A 15-metre-wide public slipway with a gently sloping surface, becoming steeper for the last 1.5 metres; vehicles reversing a trailer may need to use this steeper section to float a boat. Managed by Plymouth City Council.

Parking — A public car park sits on the seaward side of Lawrence Road next to the slip, with further limited on-street parking on Lawrence Road. Additional parking is available at the neighbouring Mount Batten Watersports and Activities Centre; its charges and any restrictions are not published by the council.

Access — Reached off Lawrence Road on the Mount Batten peninsula: from the roundabout by Haven Marina, follow the road past the hangar buildings, then turn right down the narrow road that leads to the top of the slip. No gate, barrier, height restriction or booking requirement is published for this slip. Cars should not be left parked on the slip itself.

Season — Toilets at the neighbouring Mountbatten car park on Lawrence Road close at about 7.15pm in summer and 4pm in winter, with a disabled toilet and baby-changing facilities. No recurring seasonal closure of the slipway itself is published.

Regulations — The slipway itself is free for the public to use to launch and recover most types of vessels, including towed craft. Separately, Cattewater Harbour Commissioners, the statutory harbour authority, levy an annual leisure harbour due on vessels using the harbour; the published schedule sets no reduced rate or exemption for unpowered craft. The Commissioners' Stand Up Paddleboarding Code of Conduct restricts paddleboards to launching and recovering only at public locations, of which this slip is one, and the whole of the Cattewater carries an 8-knot no-wash speed limit under the Dockyard Port of Plymouth Order 2020, enforced by the harbour office.

Mount Batten put-in sits on the Cattewater, the tidal channel where the River Plym meets Plymouth Sound, on the shoreline of the Mount Batten peninsula, across the water from Plymouth's Barbican. The nearby Mount Batten Watersports and Activities Centre runs paddleboarding, kayaking and canoeing sessions on the same stretch of water.

The Mount Batten Breakwater reaches from the peninsula into Plymouth Sound immediately west of the launch. It was built between 1878 and 1881, runs about 279 metres out from the shore with its foundations roughly 6 metres below the low-tide mark, and was later refurbished and reopened to public access; it shelters the Cattewater and Sutton Harbour on its landward side.

Above the launch stands Mount Batten Tower, a scheduled seventeenth-century artillery fort on the rock outcrop that gives the peninsula its name, a site occupied since the Bronze Age and Roman period. Historic England describes it as a circular tower 9.1 metres high and 14 metres in diameter, with walls about a metre thick, built as part of the defences of Plymouth Sound.

Nearby

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Peoples Coffee

Waterside cafe and coffee roastery at 101 Lawrence Road, Mount Batten, Plymouth PL9 9SJ.

Website

Galley Kitchen

Cafe in a former RAF hangar at Western Hangar, Lawrence Road, Mountbatten, Plymouth PL9 9SJ, opposite Mount Batten Beach.

Conditions to check

Limited exit

Access to the water is restricted for about an hour either side of low water springs, and the bottom of the slip becomes visible once the tide falls to 1.3 metres above low water springs.

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Boat traffic

The Cattewater carries a mix of fishing boats, yachts and smaller pleasure craft, alongside occasional commercial shipping bound for the Cattedown wharves.

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Boat traffic

A marked shipping channel and a merchant-ship turning basin lie off Plymouth Yacht Haven immediately east of the slip; paddlers are told to keep clear of both, entering the turning basin only after checking there is no marine traffic.

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Boat traffic

The Mount Batten to Barbican passenger ferry crosses the Cattewater near the launch.

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