The southern Lowlands beach (WA 436) is located 300 m to the west in a second small embayment. It is a 200 m long southeast-facing beach, backed and bordered by smooth vegetated, dune-draped 20-30 m high slopes. The beach receives slightly higher waves, which break across a 150 wide surf zone, with permanent rips running out along both boundary headlands. Four wheel drive tracks reach the backing slopes, with foot access down the eastern headland. Ratcliffe Bay is an open, southwest-facing bay, located between Knapp Head and Wilson Head, 15 km to the west. Most of the bay shore is exposed to the full force of the southerly waves and winds, which throughout the Pleistocene have built massive calcarenite dunes and cliffs the length of the bay shore. The dunes average 100 m in height and extend up to 3 km inland. The early Holocene beach/es that ran from Knapp Head to Wilson Inlet and supplied the dune system, has been largely eroded with only a few pockets of sand in the east (beaches WA 427-439), while a little more sand remains around the inlet mouth (beaches WA 440-444) as the beach becomes slightly sheltered by Wilson Head. Most of the shore between the head and inlet is dominated by 100-150 m high calcarenite cliffs. read more

Beach Length: 0.2km