Thursday: 25th May: Weather: 8°C to 16°C: Sunny with onshore cool breeze, nice, cool but sunny all day
Beesands to Dartmouth: 18.0k walk: 5hrs 30 mins: 9.30am to 3.00pm: 1 x 30min stop: Ascent: 700 metres
Accommodation: Eight Bells on the Embankment Dartmouth
Leaving the Cricket Inn at Beesands
Farmland Patchwork quilt Beesands
The lone walker on cliffs of Devon
Wooded path near Blackpoole sands
Looking back at Blackpool Beach
Traffic jam in a country lane
Watch out for hedgehogs
Dartmouth harbour full of yachts
600 year old Dartmouth Castle
Highlights of our day 12 were many. From Beesands, the path climbed through green and brown patchwork farmlands to Torcross where the shingle/sand path ran along side the road for 4k to the foot hills of the next cliffs and up to the small village of Strete. Then to Blackpool Sands and on to the small village of Stoke Fleming before following the wide Queen's Jubilee bridle path to Dartmouth, built in 2012.
Breakfast isn’t til 8.30am, so we have time to email, pay bills, blog, pack and have a cup of tea before going downstairs to a full 6 course breakfast. The meusli and yoghurt is nice and I have eggs on toast, Ian has salmon and scrambled eggs, but we didn’t need a full english breakfast of bacon, fried, poached or scrambled eggs, fried or grilled tomatoes, fried mushrooms, fried bread or buttered toast, and sausage, black pudding, baked beans, and bubble and squeak. I did ask for a croissant but sorry, we’ve run out.
We leave at 9.30am, and immediately there’s an uphill climb through a patchwork of farmland. then downhill to Torcross. We’ve been here before on our 1980 cycle trip and cycled across the narrow strip of Slapton Sands separating the ocean from the huge freshwater Lake called Slapton Ley. It looked like an easy 4k walk, but half of it was on loose gravelly stones, and half on sand, and we often switched back and forth between the road and the path. A bit boring as the path was bordered by a grassy hedge obscuring the sea view.
Finally we reach Strete gate at the bottom of the next set of cliffs and the path winds upward to the village of Strete. It’s 11.30am and time for a coffee, but the piezo starter on the jetfoil isn’t working - NO COFFEE!!. Damn! Lucky we are only 200 metres from a sell-all grocery store in Strete and Ian buys a gas lighter to start the jet boil. Lucky! Coffee and a biscuit is all we need after a big breakfast.
Down to Blackpool Sands. It’s busy and at the peak of summer in 8 weeks time, there’ll be sitting room only on the beach. On my map, the SWCP looks like it follows a main road, but it was a series of wonderful country lanes, so narrow that cars and trucks had difficulty passing. The lanes take us to the Queen’s Jubilee Walking track, a bridle track about 4 metres wide that runs along the top of the cliffs past manor houses and with expansive ocean views. The path takes us to the 600 year old Dartmouth Castle perched on the side of the harbour.
There’s another 2k walk around the harbour to Dartmouth town centre and it’s a rather chilly 14°C, the coolest afternoon we’ve had for two weeks. We’ve skipped lunch and arrive early in Dartmouth at 2.55pm, following the Air BnB instructions to locate Eight Bells which is the red house on the wharf. The hosue is pretty obvious when we get to the embankment and we sit and wait a while until it opens at 3pm.
Chris, our host, is at the open door and says that Lizzie is swimming but she’ll be back soon. Brrrrrr! The air temperature is 14°C and the water temperature is between 12°C and 14°C. Within a minute Lizzie shows up, hair wet from swimming and welcomes us to our ground floor bed room. I’d say it’s compact and 2 star but absolutely fabulous because it suits us perfectly - a very comfortable queensize bed, hot shower and a little sitting area with two chairs and a table the size of an old sewing machine bench. We drop our bags and walk 200 metres to the local co-op to replenish our supplies and returm with a Moretti beer, South African Shiraz, a lettuce, brie cheese, ham and prosciutto.
Back to our cosy room to have a hot shower, no washing today, and a beer and nuts followed by dinner of ham/prosciutto lettuce tomato, cheese and mayonnaise - with a beer and wine. The bed is so comfy and the WiFi is good so time to catch up blogging and whatever. Lizzie has left us a memo note to fill in our request for breakfast. She's given us a menu as long as your arm that includes everything from yoghurt fruit and meusli to a full English Breakfast. We choose something simple - yoghurt, fruit and meusli and an omelette. Then it’s time for bed at 8pm.
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