Martin's Bay tide times

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived.

Model-derived from a global ocean grid. Useful indication; expect about ±45 minutes on average vs. a local harmonic gauge, individual stations vary widely. See /methodology for per-region detail. Not for navigation.

Conditions as of 00:00 local time. Refreshes daily.

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived. · Not for navigation.

The angler tradition for major/minor fishing windows: major ≈3-hour windows around moon transit and opposition; minor ≈2-hour windows around moonrise and moonset. Times are America/Barbados local. Folk tradition, not a scientific forecast.

Last spring tide on Mon 18 May (range 0.9m). Next neap on Fri 22 May.

Spring tides cluster around new and full moons (biggest swings). Neap tides land on quarter moons (smallest swings). See the spring tide and neap tide glossary entries for the why.

Martin's Bay is a traditional fishing village in Saint John parish on the southeast Atlantic coast of Barbados, at the point where the east coast's full Atlantic exposure begins to moderate as the land turns westward toward the southern tip of the island. The village is built on a small bay between two rock headlands; local fishing boats — colourfully painted, open-hulled pirogues — are launched directly through the Atlantic shore break, a technique that requires timing the sets and has been practised by Saint John's fishing families for generations. The boats work the offshore reef and open Atlantic for dolphin fish (mahi-mahi), flying fish, kingfish, and tuna. The flying fish, Barbados's national symbol and the basis of its most iconic dish, is caught primarily in the Atlantic waters between the east and north coasts of the island from November through June; the offshore fleet from villages like Martin's Bay is part of the catching network that supplies the island's fish markets. The reef system offshore from Martin's Bay and the southern Atlantic coast is significant but largely unstudied by modern scientific survey. Coral cover has declined since the 1980s in line with regional trends (bleaching events, hurricane damage, disease) but the reef structure remains and the fish assemblage is diverse, supported by the productive Atlantic upwelling conditions on the east side of the island. The southern tip of Barbados — South Point — is approximately 8 kilometres from Martin's Bay by road. At South Point the wave character changes dramatically: the Atlantic swell from the northeast wraps around the tip and diminishes within a few hundred metres of the headland; the Caribbean to the west is typically flat by comparison. This oceanographic boundary — where the energetic Atlantic coast becomes the sheltered Caribbean coast — is one of the most dramatic coastal transitions in the Lesser Antilles. The drive south from Martin's Bay to South Point along the coastal road passes through agricultural land, coconut palms, and several smaller fishing settlements. The scenery is more working-coastal than resort-coastal and is rarely visited by tourists. Sam Lord's Castle, a 19th-century great house on the nearby Saint Philip coast, is the subject of local legend about wrecking — the story that its owner hung lanterns to lure ships onto the reef — though the historical evidence for this is thin. The castle grounds are now part of a hotel development. Beach walking at Martin's Bay is possible at low water south of the main village bay, where a rock-platform section exposed at low tide connects to the open beach toward the South Point direction. Predictions on this page come from Open-Meteo Marine, a gridded global ocean model. Accuracy is typically within plus or minus 45 minutes on timing and 0.2 to 0.3 metres on height — model-derived, not from a local gauge. The Caribbean Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH) is the regional hydrometeorological reference authority for Barbados.