There are three main river systems in the West Wight. The Western Yar is an estuary for most of its length, once the end of a much larger river system before the Isle of Wight was cut off from the mainland. A series of streams cut deep into the soft cliffs forming distinctive gully’s known as Chines. Much of the west side of the Island drain into chines, which millennia ago would have flowed into the Western Yar. The Newton River flows into the Solent at Newtown Creek, the Island’s only National Nature Reserve.
