On the right a small ship, in port-bow and broadside view, lies at anchor in a flat calm sea close to a spit of land on the left, from which a boat is coming out. The scrub-covered spit features a large beacon, behind which the ground rises in low cliffs on the far left. A similar beacon appears in a van de Velde pen-painting (grisaille) of a fleet leaving the mouth of the Vlie in 1645 (BHC0858), though this is probably a different location. On the horizon, over the spit, other distant vessels can be seen.

This work is one of a group of twelve drawings of shore scenes or distant views of the Dutch coastline in pen and brown ink (PAE5158, PAE5159, PAE5160, PAE5161, PAE5162, PAE5163, PAE5164, PAE5165, PAE5166, PAE5167, PAE5168, PAE5169). It is likely from the appearance of the ships in all these works that they were made in the 1650s. They were probably done in connection with the elder van de Velde's earliest pen-paintings, since he probably did not need such sketches later, and had passed as by several different artists until re-attributed by Sir Bruce Ingram.