Slapton to Dartmouth

We knew that we didn't have much ground to cover today and so pottered, stopping off at various attractions en route. This worked well, though I think I enjoy walks better when I am under slightly more pressure. The weather was dry again, sometimes sunny and sometimes overcast. Val Mercer cooked us a good breakfast and we chatted with her for a while so didn't leave Old Walls until about 9.15 am. We took a footpath from Slapton to Slapton Ley and then alongside the Ley, which was very pleasant. We photographed flag irises and swans on the lake.

When we reached the main road, we crossed over to look at the memorial, a thank you from the American military to the people who had to leave their homes so that 'Operation Tiger' could take place. Then we walked alongside the road, sometimes on the shingle (hard work!) and sometimes on the side of Slapton Ley, which is reeds and vegetation here, not open water. Apparently, left to its own devices, Slapton Ley will eventually turn to woodland. Mind you, that assumes that Slapton Sands will not have been irreparably breached before then, which seems unlikely. The road was seriously damaged in a storm in the early 2000s, and the flood protection work put in place to prevent a repeat of this only has a 30-50 year predicted lifetime. As we reached Strete Gate and climbed up the old road away from Slapton Sands we were were left thinking what a turbulent recent past the area has had, and how precarious its current state is.

The old road brought us to the village of Strete, with good views back the way we had come. The South West Coast Path will soon be diverted to the coastward side, from halfway up the old road to the middle of the village - the route may be completed later in 2012, but it certainly isn't open yet. So, at the top of the hill, we had to follow the main road through the village. This wasn't anything like as bad as people make out, though we did have to stay out of the way for an emergency ambulance and then for a lorry delivering building supplies.

As we were leaving Strete we took a path back towards the coast - this is another relatively recent section, and Le Messurier describes the first bit of it as 'deceptively level'. That's as maybe, but you soon enough encounter a very steep descent and ascent, in a grassy valley above a cove. You then take another recent diversion to the landward side of the road, descending to Blackpool Sands over a packhorse bridge that was built in 2005!

We visited our first 'attraction' here, Blackpool Gardens. We bought tickets (the princely sum of £2.50 each) from the man who was primarily collecting £5 per car for parking at Blackpool Sands, and he directed us to the green door on the other side of the main road. It's a real secret garden - it is not particularly carefully tended but it is exactly what it claims to be, a plantsman's garden, with semi tropical plants 'gathered from the four corners of the world'. I particularly liked Davidia involucrata, the 'Pocket handkerchief tree'. We bought lunch from the Venus cafe at Blackpool Sands. One of the guidebooks recommends this cafe, but it looked quite expensive. However the 'hatch' had opened for self service meals, and this seemed rather more reasonable. We had tuna sandwiches and tea/coffee.

The next section of path runs alongside the A379, but it is on a separate path and this was absolutely fine. You then take a minor road to Stoke Fleming, another around the back of the village and then another towards Little Dartmouth. I know it is unavoidable, but it was rather a lot of road walking, with lots of ascents and descents, and it felt a long time since we'd seen the sea. Things improved as we passed the Little Dartmouth car park and took a track back to the sea at Warren Point and there were good views to Froward Point, which we will visit tomorrow. We climbed up around Compass Cove and then down to Blackstone Point, very attractive, but staying on the coast path rather than following one of the more inland routes gave us rather a lot of ups and downs!

We passed the pretty Sugary Cove and eventually emerged at Dartmough Castle. I think we visited when the children were small, when we were English Heritage members (which we are not now) but we still had time to kill, so decided to pay our £4.80 each. I'm pleased we did this - it's an interesting place, providing good insight into how the various little castles in the area protected the mouth of the River Dart. In addition to the cannons (of which there are plenty) it was interesting to discover that, at several times in history, they have actually put a chain across the river between Dartmouth and Kingswear castles to keep the enemy out. We also visited St Petrox Church, right next to the castle.

We continued along the road past Warfleet and into Dartmouth proper, a most attractive town. We stopped for some local Dartmouth ice cream - lovely - and spent some time working out the ferry options for tomorrow. Then we walked through the town to Avondale B&B, which is on a very steep hill. The advantage of the hill is that our room (shown to us by Clive Osborne) has a superb view. This is the B&B where Richard deliberately chose the family room without en suite, because this bedroom does have a private bathroom and this has a bath! This was definitely the best choice - we have a lovely big bedroom and a separate large bathroom, and a bath of course! In the evening we had perhaps the tastiest meal of this section of the walk - Wild mushroom polenta cake, spinach and sweet and sour peppers at the Windjammer Inn. However the cider was disappointing, so we bought a bottle of Thatcher's Single Variety Katy from a shop and drank this later in the evening - this was a bit disappointing too - I think last night's Devon Mist had spoiled us.

Following day