Holy Island Map – Interactive Visitor Map of Lindisfarne
Looking for a map of Holy Island? Our interactive Holy Island map shows you where the main places to visit on Lindisfarne actually are, including Lindisfarne Castle, Lindisfarne Priory, the harbour, Lookout Tower, Castle Point Lime Kilns, the visitor car park, public toilets and other useful stops around the island.
You can move around the map, zoom in for a closer look and tap any pin for more information. Where we have a full guide to a place, we have linked it straight from the map too. It is a simple way to get your bearings before you visit Holy Island and just as useful on your phone while you are there.
Using Our Interactive Holy Island Map
The map above is fully interactive, so you can drag it around, zoom in for more detail and tap any marker to see what is there. Some pins also include links to our full Holy Island guides if you want to read more before deciding where to go.
On a phone, the map is especially handy while you are actually on Lindisfarne. You can use the location button to see where you are and work out which places are nearby, rather than trying to match everything up from memory.
The map is there to help you understand where places are, not to suggest that you should walk in a straight line between them. Holy Island has roads, tracks, footpaths, fields, rocky shoreline and sensitive natural areas, so always follow the proper paths and signs on the ground.
If you want a route that links several of the main places around the island, our Holy Island circular walk is a better place to start.
Finding Your Way Around Holy Island
The easiest way to understand Holy Island is to start at the visitor car park. After crossing the tidal causeway, the main road brings you towards the village and the large visitor car park at Chare Ends sits on its edge. For most people arriving by car, this is where exploring the island begins.
From the car park it is only a short walk into the village, with Lindisfarne Priory and St Mary’s Church close by on the southern side of the settlement. The Heugh rises beside them, with the Lookout Tower above the shoreline. Continue towards the harbour and the views begin to open out, with Lindisfarne Castle standing prominently ahead.
The castle is farther from the village than it can appear in photographs. The National Trust gives the distance from the visitor car park to Lindisfarne Castle as around one mile each way, which is worth knowing before setting off, particularly with younger children or anyone who finds longer walks difficult.
Once you can see those main points on the map, the layout of Holy Island becomes much easier to understand.
Holy Island Visitor Car Park
We have marked the Holy Island visitor car park at Chare Ends because it is the most useful starting point for anyone arriving by car. It is the main council visitor car park on the edge of the village, rather than somewhere tucked among the village streets.
From here you can walk into the village, towards the Priory and church or continue out towards the harbour and Lindisfarne Castle. Northumberland County Council operates Chare Ends as a pay-and-display visitor car park, with all-day parking available.
Holy Island Village
Holy Island village is small, easy to walk around and where you will find most of the places to eat, drink and browse. Marygate and the surrounding lanes are home to cafés, pubs and little independent shops, so it is a natural place to stop for a wander before heading farther around the island.
Lindisfarne Priory and St Mary’s Church sit close to the village, with the Heugh, shoreline and harbour all within easy walking distance. That compact layout is one of the things that makes Holy Island so easy to explore on foot.
We have marked the village on the map because it is such a useful point to get your bearings. Once you know where the village sits, the rest of Holy Island becomes much easier to understand.
Lindisfarne Priory
Lindisfarne Priory sits immediately beside the village and is one of the easiest major landmarks to reach from the car park. The ruins visitors see today include the remains of the medieval priory established by monks from Durham, on an island already famous for its much earlier Anglo-Saxon monastery.
There is also an English Heritage museum here, making this much more than a ruin you simply look at from outside. We have kept the history short on this map page because the main purpose here is to help you see exactly where the Priory sits in relation to the village, St Mary’s Church and the Heugh. For the wider story of Holy Island and how the Priory fits into it, see our Holy Island Visitor Guide and Holy Island History page.
St Mary's Church
Beside the Priory is St Mary's Parish Church, so it makes sense to see the two together on the map even though they are separate places. It is very easy to move between them on foot and this small area around the southern side of the village contains an extraordinary amount of Holy Island's story.
The church remains a place of worship rather than simply another visitor attraction, so visit respectfully and remember that services and church activities come first.
The Heugh and Holy Island Lookout Tower
The raised ground of the Heugh sits between the village and the sea and is one of the places where an interactive map really starts to help. Climb up here and the shape of Holy Island becomes much clearer, with views across the village, harbour, Priory and out towards Lindisfarne Castle.
The Lookout Tower stands on the Heugh. It is a former coastguard lookout that was converted for visitors, with a glazed upper level giving wide views over Holy Island and the surrounding coast. It is one of the smaller places on the island that could easily be missed if you were simply heading from the village towards the castle.
Old Lifeboat House
Close to the shoreline below the Heugh is the Old Lifeboat House, now used to tell part of Holy Island's lifeboat story. It is another of those places that makes far more sense once you see it marked on a map because it sits away from the busiest village streets.
The building is one of Holy Island's small community heritage sites and is currently free to visit when open. There are no fixed opening times, so we would treat it as something to look for while exploring this part of the island rather than make a journey depend entirely on finding the doors open.
Holy Island Harbour
Follow the island east from the village and you reach Holy Island Harbour. This is a working harbour rather than an attraction created for visitors, but it is an important part of understanding the island and one of the most recognisable areas around Lindisfarne.
The harbour also acts as a useful landmark when exploring. With the village behind you and the harbour to your right, Lindisfarne Castle is ahead across the open ground. The famous upturned boats used as sheds can also be seen around this part of the island, but remember that boats, equipment and working areas should be given space.
Lindisfarne Castle
There is not much chance of losing Lindisfarne Castle once it comes into view. It stands high on its rocky crag at the eastern end of this part of Holy Island and is one of the island's great landmarks.
What the map does show particularly well is its position away from the village. The castle is around a one mile walk each way from the visitor car park. The final approach to the castle itself involves a cobbled ramp and steps, so seeing a castle pin on a map should not be mistaken for completely level or step-free access all the way inside.
There is plenty around the castle even if you are not going indoors, including the surrounding headland, Gertrude Jekyll's walled garden and the nearby lime kilns.
Castle Point Lime Kilns
Beyond the castle are the huge stone Castle Point Lime Kilns, one of our favourite surprises on Holy Island because they feel completely different from the religious and military history for which Lindisfarne is better known.
These 19th-century industrial remains stand near the shore and can be explored from the surrounding paths. The National Trust describes them as some of the largest examples of their kind in the country, and parts of the old wagonway associated with the lime workings can still be followed through the landscape.
They are exactly the sort of place we wanted on this map. You can see the castle from a long way away; you could quite easily visit Holy Island without realising the lime kilns were there.
Public Toilets and Accessible Parking
We have marked the public toilets at Green Lane on the map because it is one of those useful places you will probably want to know about before you need it.
The toilets include an accessible facility and a Changing Places toilet. Green Lane also has parking for Blue Badge holders and coaches, while most visitors arriving by car will use the main Chare Ends visitor car park instead.
It is a handy pin to save on the map, especially if you are exploring the village, Priory, harbour or Heugh.
The Holy Island Causeway
No map of Holy Island would be complete without the causeway because it controls when you can get on and off the island.
Holy Island is connected to mainland Northumberland by a tidal road which is covered by the sea around high tide. The safe road crossing windows change every day, and Northumberland County Council warns that weather can affect conditions and advises allowing an additional 30 minutes when using its published times.
We would never plan a visit from a screenshot, an old timetable or a tide time copied onto another website. Check the official Holy Island causeway safe crossing times shortly before travelling and make sure you know when you need to be back across.
The marked Pilgrims Route across the sands is different from the road causeway and the council specifically warns that the road crossing timetable does not apply to that walking route.
Using the Map for a Holy Island Walk
You can certainly use this map to understand where you are while walking around Holy Island, but we have deliberately not turned this page into another walking guide.
If you want a shorter circular route linking some of the places marked here, we have a separate Holy Island walk that leaves the village, heads towards the Castle Point Lime Kilns and Lindisfarne Castle, returns via the Lookout Tower and Priory and finishes back in the village.
That page contains the route itself. This one stays as the simple overview you can open whenever you want to know, where is that?
Exploring Beyond the Main Holy Island Sights
Zoom the map out and Holy Island quickly looks much bigger than the little group of buildings around the village. Beyond the castle, Priory and harbour are dunes, shoreline, tracks and the wider Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve.
That quieter side of the island is part of what makes Lindisfarne special, but it is also a protected natural landscape rather than empty ground waiting to be explored anywhere you choose. Keep to established paths and follow any signs, temporary restrictions or requests you find on the ground, particularly around wildlife-sensitive areas.
For a first visit, there is already plenty to see around the village, Heugh, harbour and castle side of the island without trying to cover every corner in one day.
Prefer a Paper Map?
For anyone heading farther around Holy Island on foot, a proper Ordnance Survey map is still worth having alongside a phone. Holy Island is covered by (Ad) OS Explorer 340 – Holy Island & Bamburgh.
Our interactive map is intended for finding visitor locations and understanding how the main sights fit together. It is not intended to replace detailed mapping for longer walks across the wider island.
More Than a Map
One of the reasons we made this page is that a map can answer one question extremely well – where is everything? – but it cannot tell you what somewhere is actually like.
That is where the rest of our Holy Island guides come in. We have explored the island as a family and built separate guides to the castle, lime kilns, Lookout Tower, Old Lifeboat House and our circular walk, along with a much bigger guide for planning a complete visit.
Use this map to get your bearings, tap into whichever places catch your eye and then build a Holy Island day that suits you rather than trying to rush around ticking off every pin.
Explore More of Holy Island
Once you have used the map to get your bearings, our individual guides can help you explore Holy Island in much more detail. Start with our complete Holy Island visitor guide, then discover Lindisfarne Castle, the Holy Island Lime Kilns, Holy Island Lookout Tower and the Old Lifeboat House. You can also follow our Holy Island circular walk, explore the island's story through the Holy Island history timeline, or check the view before travelling with our live Holy Island webcams.