6.3km along the coast and 7.2km inland. About a third of section 52 in the SWCPA handbook
After a couple of days of rather dull and drizzly weather, this morning was cold but sunny which was a nice change. Our Sat-Nav (Francois) seems unable to distinguish between the “normal” Devon lanes, with high banks and passing places and the very narrow ones with more potholes and less passing places, and so we took a rather slow route to a little Nation Trust carpark at Mill Bay on the edge of East Portlemouth. This is not far from the ferry to Salcombe and is a good sandy beach with views across to Salcombe.
From here we took a bridleway and a series of minor roads towards East Prawle before taking another bridleway back down to the Coastal Path near Elender Cove. Here we met a lady who was due to meet a friend, Leon, but thought that she could see him on the next headland, where we were heading, so we offered to let him know she was there. However, as we got near, there was a lady sitting on a rock, and clearly not Leon – nor were either of the next couple that we met – so we will never know whether she met her friend.
The path from here to Gara Rock is mainly quite good, generally level but with some rocks to climb over at times and the sun made it a much more pleasant walk than in the wind and drizzle yesterday.
At Gara rock, with a big hotel and restaurant at the top of the cliff, the coastal path descends to cross a small stream and there is a short, but steep path down to the beach. A pleasant sandy bay, with no facilities, but a surprising number of people considering everyone must have walked at least from the carpark at the top. This seemed a good place to stop for lunch.
After a fairly steep ascent again the path is fairly level and mostly quite good, as it rounds Limebury Point you get views of Salcombe harbour and the town clinging to the cliffs on the other side of the estuary with its painted houses.. The path passes through deciduous woodland, so seemed quite open at this time of year before passing another sandy bay and getting to the Carpark. At low tide it is possible to walk most of the way to the ferry along the beach, but we had to walk along the road. Unfortunately the ice-cream shop by the ferry was closed so we had to return to the car and be content with our own cake.
