Fairlight and Fairlight Cove
Fairlight is an East Sussex village built on high land just half a mile inland from the soft clay and sandstone cliffs that keep the English Channel at bay.Fairlight's neighbour Fairlight Cove is the more coastal of the two settlements and is much larger.
Both are a couple of miles east of Hastings, with the Hastings Country Park acting as an undeveloped space protecting the separate identity of Fairlight.
Fairlight and coastal erosion
Fairlight Cove occupies an enviable clifftop position, but erosion of the soft rock strata is a constant and real threat to the long term future of the southernmost houses here.The Fairlight Cove Preservation Trust has been formed to try to convince the government to stump up the money for the coastal defences that would be needed to prevent further erosion.
Places of interest around Fairlight
Interesting places in and around Fairlight include:- Mallydams Wood is an RSPCA animal sanctuary base din 22 hectares of woodland donated by local artist Horace Quick in 1962. Thousands of wild animals have been cared for at Mallydams Wood since then and they have an Open Day once a year;
- St Andrew's Church, whose tall elegant tower can be seen from well out at sea, is not a particularly old church, dating from 1845.
- Fairlight Glen a woodland where a dip in the top of the cliffs allows access to the beach and the bottom of the cliff face. There is a nudist beach here overlooking Covehurst Bay.
- The Saxon Shore Way is a coastal footpath which runs right through the middle of Fairlight Cove.
More about Fairlight
The church contains the grave of Richard D'Oyley Carte, founder of the opera company of that name.Fairlight parish is known as the United Benefice of Fairlight, Guestling and Pett.
Fairlight travel notes
The nearest railway stations to Fairlight are at Three Oaks and Ore in Hastings.By road, Fairlight lies on the road which connects Hastings and Winchelsea Beach.