Overview
Discover challenging and dramatic walking trails shaped by the footsteps of traders, smugglers, saints and pirates. Cornish walking trails will reveal ancient tin mines, clifftop castles, timeless fishing villages and wild moors as you travel through a landscape of huge cliffs and hidden coves that goes back to the depths of time itself. In between the coastal drama, iconic harbours such as St Ives and Padstow give walkers access to some of the UK‘s best restaurants and coastal hotels. A county encircled by the wild Atlantic ocean, there is over 330 miles of spectacular world class coast path here taking you around the farthest corners of England - put simply it feels like walking on the edge of the world.
Stretching from coast to coast across the southwest of England, Devon is a richly diverse county with rugged shores and cliffs in the north, and classic Victorian seaside resorts in the south. In between you'll find tranquil green pastures, wooded gorges and the two dramatic wild moors in the National Parks of Dartmoor and Exmoor. Choose Devon for its walking variety, and you'll find that the popular image of cream teas and thatched cottages is true - but that Devon is so much more once you explore it on two feet. Coast to coast routes like the Two Moors Way will offer a journey through it all from the wild northern shores that inspired the Romantic poets to the maritime ports of the south coast.
Free your soul and clear your mind! Walking on the wild moors of these National Parks is a wonderful antidote to modern living. England's last true wilderness, Dartmoor offers 365 square miles of virtually uninhabited freedom with high moors and twisted dramatic granite tors a land of myths, ghosts and legends. Exmoor, its smaller and more gentle neighour, is 250 Square miles of near perfect and unique beauty, with high uplands swathed in heather and steep, wooded gorges and rushing streams. See Dartmoor ponies and Exmoor stags in these wildlife rich areas, home to 30 species of mammals and over 240 types of bird. The moors offer a unique opportunity for more challenging walking where the only human sound you will hear is the rhythm of your own breath.
Avoid the crowds and discover “Secret Somerset” missed by so many rushing headlong for the far South West. The 'land of the summer people' was named in a time when this area could only be visited in the summer months as the sea receded. Today its a rich, fertile and 'for real' landscape crowned by the fine walking ridges of the Mendip and Quantock Hills both protected areas of outstanding natural beauty. Rising up over King Arthur‘s Vale of Avalon along with the magical Tor at Glastonbury, walkers will find hidden gorges, wooded combes and the best inland panoramas of the South West. Also boasting its own Jurassic Coast Path, providing a gateway into the wilds of Exmoor National Park, Somerset offers walking routes without the crowds for those who want to find..... what the rest miss.
Dorset has a comfortable old world “English” feel to it and its walking routes traverse a rather more green and agricultural land of thatched cottages, cream teas.... and fossils ! Walkers here will find the more gentle rolling farmland, pretty villages and chalk ridges beloved by Thomas Hardy that sweep down to end abruptly at the World Heritage Jurassic Coast. Here, alongside the sea, those after more challenging routes can take a walking holiday through time itself amongst the dramatic chalk stacks, cliffs and arches of the Dorsetshire fossil coast. An area that can be very busy in high season but often suits walkers looking for more gentle and less exposed walking than the far west of the region.
Wales offers some of the best walking and outdoor activities to be had anywhere in the world. The 870-mile Welsh Coast Path was only fully opened in 2012 and is the world's first walk along the entire coast of a nation. The terrain is on an equally grand scale with towering cliffs, vast stretches of unspoilt golden sands, imposing castles, offshore islands and to the north there is the backdrop of Snowdonia National Park with its stunning mountains. Wales in general offers walkers great value for money compared to more popular areas like Cornwall with walking options to suit everyone, from those who want the cosmopolitan restaurants and facilities of towns like Tenby and St Davids, through to isolated and remote forests and coastal hills that sit on the very cusp of the Snowdonian Peaks. Bursting with confidence and pride in its “Welshness”, its Celtic history, language and culture there has never been a better time for walkers to enter Wales.
The South West Coast Path is the UK's longest National Trail and one of the top ten walking routes in the world. It snakes, dips and rises continuously on its way through a staggering 1014km (630 miles) of pristine coastline, 450 miles of which is through nationally protected areas. It's a challenge too; walking the entire South West Coast Path is the equivalent to scaling Mount Everest four times! From towering cliffs to hidden coves, ghostly tin mines to lush subtropical wooded creeks. One minute a dramatic rock theatre hewn out of the cliffs, the next a prehistoric fossilized forest or a 20thC Art Deco Island Hotel. What sets The South West Coast Path apart from other trails is that around almost every corner is yet another surprise as you retrace the footsteps and histories of the tin miners, fisherman, smugglers, wreckers and the customs men who chased them.
17th May 2023 - We are open for enquiries for 2023 and 2024 dates on all routes
Distance 10.5 miles - Grade - Mainly Moderate with some strenuous sections - what these grades mean
From the impressive Lizard Lighthouse, Tennyson’s “Southern Eyes of Britain” you soon come across the huge conical hole in the cliff top know as Lions den created when a sea cave collapsed in 1847.
Climbing Bass Point covered in the South African Hottentot Fig you reach the Lloyds Signal Station which had in its heyday 1000 ships a month passing by to collect and deliver semaphore messages and register their route onwards.
The Old Coastguard lookout here is still manned and as you head into the more remote sections of the Cornwall Coast Path you will be logged in as you pass.
Serpentine Steps, a Shist Rock seat and Marconi’s experimental wireless station now restored by the National Trust are all passed before descending to Church Cove and its crumbling buildings from the Pilchard Fishing industry in days long gone.
Beyond this admire Hugga Dridgee or the Devils Frying pan, so called due to its boiling waters, a stunning natural arch bridge over the mouth of an inlet.
Welcome refreshments are found at Cadgwith a timeless Cornish Village where the fisherman still winch boats onto the cove to land lobster and crabs amongst thatched white washed stone cottages.
Overnight stops at Cadgwith on the South West Coast Path
In the afternoon pass through Kennack Sands a popular bathing spot with its rock pools full of sea cucumbers, starfish and other surprises. From Beagles Point you enter one of the most remote sections of the lizard. Its here notorious Pirate Captain John Avery is reported to have buried the fabulous treasures he took from the Great Mogul of India’s ships.
Reaching Black Head the Cornwall Coast Path around the Lizard turns from east to north with first glimpses across Falmouth Bay and for those walking further along the coast as far as Dodman Point on the Roseland Peninsular. More menacingly and much closer The Manacles appear below you, a fearsome reef whose jagged points have taken over 150 ships including the Mohegan which sank just as the passengers were sitting down to dinner leading to106 lost lives all buried in a mass grave at St Kerverne which took 3 days to dig. At Chynhalls Point the protective rampart of the Iron Age Cliff Castle is still clearly visible over the neck of the peninsular. Finally some modern day comforts present themselves as you arrive in the pretty village of Coverack
Overnight stops at Coverack on the South West Coast Path
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