We have just come back from staying for 4 days at Osmingtom Mills and walked from Durdle Door to Abbotsbury in 5 days.
Lovely sunny weather but cold East wind at times – and interesting are with lots of contrast.
Full descriptions and pictures coming soon
New Forest, like lots of the country went into “Tier 4” on 30th December, only a few days after being placed in Tier 3. Unfortunately this means that we will be unable to continue around the coast until restrictions start to be lifted – I think this is more likely to be early summer, rather than the Spring that the Prime minister seems to be hoping for.
However we are at least able to walk from home to some nice places – the pictuure below id Keyhaven, where we walked today – 16.5km round trip.
With the new tiers that came into force on Boxing day, we are stuck where we live in the New Forest. To the East is Southampton and the rest of Hampshire, which is in Tier 4, so we can’t go there, and probably wouldn’t want to at present.
To the East, Dorset remains in Tier 2, so we are not allowed to go there – so we are stuck in the New Forest for the moment. Not a bad place to be stuck, but not useful for our Coastal Walk. We have already completed the part from home to the Dorset boundary at Chewton Bunny, which is not very far.
The remainder of the New Forest Coast to our East, has poor access for walkers, due to historic land-ownership and environmental designations, some of which have resulted from the lack of access and hence disturbance. This may change a little with the English Coastal Path but I think only marginally.
So unfortunately we are unable to progress until the Covid19 restrictions begin to be eased – it would be nice to think this could happen soon – but I think it is likely to be Easter before the effect of the vaccine allows significant easing of the restrictions.
We have just stayed for three days in a Static Caravan in Swanage which has allowed us to complete the walk through the Lulworth Ranges during the weekend and have toady done a short walk from Lulworth Cove to Durdle Door.
The walk through the Ranges is spectacular, dramatic views and dramatic weather – wind and rain, then a lovely sunny, but cold day, then fog. The rain made some of the paths very slippery in places and this is the steepest section of the path so-far.
Full details and pictures are now be on the website soon click here.
No that the 2nd lockdown has finished, hopefully we can continue. So we have booked a static caravan at Swanage and can hopefully do the Range walks to Lulworth Cove – the weather is not looking great but hopefully it won’t be too bad.
More details when we have completed the next section
On Saturday 31st November Boris Johnson announced a four week lockdown for the whole of England. As this includes a ban on “non-essential travel” I’m afraid that this stops any real progress for our walk and although the lockdown is due to finish on 2nd December, at present this seems to me to be more hope than reality.
As the next section of the walk is the Lulworth ranges, our plan was to use our camper-van and spend two days over the weekend – we will have to wait and see whether this is a practical proposition in December or January.
On a more positive note the lockdown will mean I have a little more time to improve the website and we have discovered that the South West Coastal Path Association has some very nice Christmas cards – so we can write these rather than see the views>
22nd October
This looked like the last reasonably fine day before we loose an hour’s daylight at the end of the day and the next section of the walk, from Kimmerage to Lulworth, is complicated as it is only open when the Ranges are not being used. This is mainly at weekends – there is a website that gives details.
So we decided that it would be good to complete the route to Kimmeridge and then decide when to do the rather strenuous Range walks.
We parked at an old Quarry at Kimmeridge and walked along the ridge to our previous finishing point near Chapman’s Pool – then, due to showers and yesterday’s rain, a rather slippery walk, though with impressive views.
More information and photos on the website in a few days
We have now completed the “Home” section of the coast from Lymington to Sandbanks.
The next part is the South West Coastal Path, which runs from Minehead in Somerset to Studland in Dorset. We will be starting at Studland and heading in the reverse direction, clockwise.
The South West Coastal Path Association publishes a guide to the path and divides it into 70 sections that are suggested for hay or half-day walks, but they are designed assuming public transport is available, so we won’t be sticking to them strictly.
Assuming we manage to do one section a week, on average, we should get to Minehead in the spring of 2022 – I think that is a realistic date for Covid19 restrictions to be over – but we will have to wait and see.
As we go West we will inevitably be getting further from home, and so need to stay away – so we have booked a campsite in Swanage for two days next week to stay in our camper-van.
I’ll put more on the Blog then
Description of all walks is now available on the Website
Today we completed the walk from home to the start of the South West Coastal Path by walking from Bournemouth Pier to the Sandbanks ferry.
I will write a full description in a few days and publish when I get time and a better understanding of WordPress.