Westward Ho! to Padstow
11th-20th May 2009
This 79-mile section of the South West Coast Path starts in Devon and ends in Cornwall. It includes specatular scenery, with rock strata lying at amazing angles and tightly folded. When you see the rugged coastal scenery around Hartland Quay, you begin to appreciate why there have been so many shipwrecks here.
This section of path also includes some quite demanding walking, with steep descents and ascents, frequently from top of a cliff down to sea level to cross a stream and then back up to the top of the cliff again. According to the the distance calculator on the website of the South West Coast Path Association you climb over 6500 metres in walking this section of the path (and, more significantly for my long-suffering knees, presumably you descend by a similar amount).
However it's not all hard grind; there is level walking on cliff tops and some walking on beaches (especially in the approach to Rock, from where you catch the ferry to Padstow). And much of the landscape is gentler too; you pass through attractive towns and villages including Bucks Mills, Clovelly, Crackington Haven, Boscastle (shown in photo), Tintagel, Post Gaverne, Port Isaac, Port Quin and Padstow. Many of these places have an industrial past, linked to slate mining or the processing of pilchards, but tourism is the major industry now (with some fishing); the fishing boats in the harbour and whitewashed cottages clustered around a natural inlet or perched precariously on a hillside add to the attractiveness.
One of the real surprises (hardly mentioned in the guidebooks) was the mile after mile of beautiful ancient woodland, especially in the section from Westward Ho! to Hartland Point. When we were there the woods were carpeted with bluebells, a definite advantage of walking the path in May. Another advantage was that the path wasn't too busy; we met one young man walking the whole of the path from Poole to Minehead in one go, apart from that the only serious walkers we met were a few other couples. We were unusual in that we had left our car at home, the others were moving their car from B&B to B&B and using buses to close the loop.
In addition to the bluebells, we saw primroses, thrift, red and white campion, orchids, gorse and rhodedendrons, as well as wildflowers I don't know the name of. The weather wasn't brilliant - it rained most days, though not for the whole of any. Wind was the most significant factor. We had planned to visit Lundy on Monday 12th May, before setting off on the walk proper, but the ferry didn't run because of the poor weather forecast. Then, when we were on the South West Coast Path itself, we occasionally had a real struggle in order to move forward against the wind, and when we were confronted by horizontal hail on Castle Point (on the approach to Crackington Haven) we had no option but to sit down facing the other way and wait for it to pass. Fortunately the bad weather came in showers, with plenty of sunshine in between.
We booked the trip through Contours Walking Holidays and apart from the fact that one leg (Hartland Quay to Bude) was too demanding for us, the arrangements were generally excellent and all the B&Bs were good. We travelled to Westward Ho! by train via Paddington to Exeter, then on the Tarka Line to Barnstaple and the Number 1 bus from Barnstaple to Westward Ho! We spent two nights at Culloden House, with pleasant evening meals at The Village Inn and Country Cousins.
We'd admired the beautiful countriside as we travelled from Exeter to Barnstaple, so when the boat to Lundy was cancelled we decided to spend the day exploring inland Devon further. We caught the bus to Bideford then followed the Tarka Trail up the valley of the River Torridge to Great Torrington and back. The Tarka Trail follows an 180-mile figure of eight around Barnstaple, and some of its length is shared with the South West Coast Path. The thirty miles of the Tarka Trail from Braunton to Meeth are on disused railway tracks, and we'd walked along this section from Braunton to Instow and from Instow to Bideford last year; we continued from Bideford this year. The countriside was very varied (initially tidal estuary then up the River Torridge to the part of the river where Tarka the Otter was born, then along the track of the former Rolle Canal and up a steep hill across Torrington Common to Great Torrington) but it was all lovely.
At the end of the walk, we caught a bus from Padstow to Bodmin Parkway, then the train home via London.