Crane Beach 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.

Crane Beach is in Saint Philip parish on the southeast coast of Barbados, at the base of a clifftop that has given the Crane Hotel — established in 1887 and one of the oldest hotels in the Caribbean still in operation — its commanding position above the water. The beach is a 200-metre arc of pink-tinged coral sand, the colour coming from the coral fragments and foram shells in the sand composition. The pink tinge is subtle rather than dramatic — more visible when the sand is wet and reflecting light than when it is dry — but it is a genuine characteristic of the Crane Beach sand that distinguishes it from the whiter beaches on the west and south coasts. The beach is exposed to the southeast Atlantic on a coast that faces roughly 120 degrees, meaning southeast swell enters the bay directly. When southeast swell is running — most consistently in July and August, driven by the southern hemisphere swell systems that wrap around the Atlantic — Crane Beach produces a beach break that is unusual for Barbados's south coast: a proper surfable wave breaking over sand rather than reef. The wave is inconsistent (it requires the right swell direction and sufficient height, conditions that align a few dozen days per year) and the shore break can be heavy. The rest of the year the bay receives the diffracted residual of northeast trade wind swell from the east coast, which is significantly reduced by the time it wraps around South Point, and the sea is typically manageable for swimming. The clifftop position of the Crane Hotel gives a view over the beach and the southeast Atlantic that is one of the most photographed hotel vantages in Barbados. The hotel complex has expanded over the decades to include a residential development of suites and apartments on the clifftop; day access to the beach includes a beach facility charge that entitles use of the hotel's cliff-edge pool. The access to the beach itself from the public road involves either passing through the hotel or using the public right of access at the south end of the beach. The beach arc is backed by low red-brown cliff in the same coral limestone as most of Barbados's east and southeast coast. Several sea caves have been cut into the cliff base by wave action and are accessible at low water on calm days. Tidal range at Crane Beach is mixed semidiurnal, spring range approximately 0.5 to 0.7 metres — the small range of the Caribbean-adjacent southeast coast. 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.