Dorset, England

Poole Quay slipway, near the RNLI museum

Parking — The Quay visitors multi-storey car park (BH15 1SB) is the nearest, with 539 spaces including 16 disabled bays, a 1.9 metre height restriction, and 24-hour opening.

Access — The slipway is on Poole Quay in the town centre, reached on foot along the quayside a short walk from the main shops.

Season — A 10-knot speed limit applies in the harbour's main channels from 1 April to 30 September (the entrance itself stays at 10 knots year-round). Poole Harbour Commissioners' Bird Sensitive Areas apply harbour-wide from 1 November to 31 March, though the areas named for overwintering birds lie elsewhere in the harbour, not at Poole Quay.

Regulations — Poole Harbour Commissioners are the statutory harbour authority; paddleboarding is not permitted in the harbour entrance or the main shipping channels, and paddlers are asked to follow PHC's Stand Up Paddleboarding Code of Practice. Unpowered craft such as paddleboards, canoes and kayaks are exempt from harbour dues and need no permit.

Poole Harbour is a broad, shallow natural harbour of around 36 square kilometres, with a single narrow entrance about two miles south-east of here. This slipway sits at the east end of Poole Quay, in front of the former RNLI lifeboat house at Fisherman's Dock, now the Poole Old Lifeboat Museum, with open water toward Brownsea Island and the Purbeck Hills.

Poole Harbour carries Special Protection Area, Site of Special Scientific Interest and Ramsar designations, reflecting internationally important numbers of overwintering and breeding birds. Beds of eelgrass, both narrow-leaved and dwarf eelgrass, grow on the harbour bed; Poole Harbour Commissioners ask paddlers to know where these beds lie and not to paddle or land within them, as damaging them is an offence.

The lifeboat house beside this slipway, now the Poole Old Lifeboat Museum, operated from 1882 to 1974. This slipway itself was built in front of the boathouse in 1897, because the town's public slipway was often blocked by other boats.

Nearby

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Quay Cafe

Cafe on Poole Quay, close to the slipway.

Website

Deli on the Quay

Cafe on Poole Quay, close to the slipway.

Website

Rockley Park

Haven holiday park with touring and camping pitches open to the public, about 2.2 miles from this slipway, on the harbour's Hamworthy shore.

Website

Conditions to check

Tidal flow

Ebb tidal streams across the harbour draw toward the single entrance, about two miles south-east of this slipway, reaching up to 4.5 knots on spring tides at the entrance itself.

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Boat traffic

Poole Harbour Commissioners define the harbour's main shipping channels, including the Swash, Haven, Middle Ship and Little Channels, in which leisure craft are asked to take care. The port is served by regular cross-Channel ferries, including Brittany Ferries to Cherbourg and Condor Ferries to the Channel Islands and St Malo, alongside coastal trading vessels.

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Shallow or rocky

Poole Harbour is extremely shallow away from its single dredged channel, averaging around 48 centimetres in depth, with extensive mudflats, saltmarsh and reed bed exposed at low water.

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