South West Coast Path: Sec 4 Ilfracombe to Woolacombe 26th April 2022

On Tuesday the 26th April 2022 I woke up at 0730 hours in the dorm at Ocean back packers hostel. After a quick cup of tea and a snack bar I set off. I walked back to the Varity statue thinking I'd pick up the path there, but no back to where I came and then up Capstone Road and around Capstone Point.

I walked around the point and I am now looking at the Landmark Theatre, my legs are heavy and still very much aching from yesterdays walk. I thought shall I just get the bus back to Lynton and head home? But then I thought No I'm here now and I'll be back on holiday to Woolacombe in July to carry on so I must finish there. Besides there won't be as much climbing today as yesterday. I was wrong whilst the climbs were less there were still plenty of them!

So I decide to walk on. Up the steps next to the theatre and right onto Granville Road and then up Torr Park Avenue, then right at Avoncourt and onto path heading for Lee.

I am on the path known as Torrs walk and this zig zags up the cliff steeply, urggh I'm climbing already, but I thought hopefully it'll stay level for someway once I get up. So I puff my way up to the top.

Looking back to Ilfracombe

I am now walking along the cliff top.

I am enjoying the level walking along the cliff, but I know this won't last as I look at the guidebook and the view ahead.

I reach Flat Head and then out onto a road that starts off downhill to Lee Bay. I know all too well what goes down will eventually go back up!

Walking down hill is hard on my quads that are screaming with pain and the road just gets steeply as it goes on.

I now enter the village of Lee and Lee Bay.

I walk past a boarded up hotel that's seen better days, a redevelopment for someone maybe.

The village of Lee lies at the foot of what is known locally as the Fuchsia Valley, and consists of around 100 properties, mostly old in style. The village centre is about a 350 metres (380 yd) from the sea, and is linked to the area around the bay by a road and level footpath. Lee is served by a combined pub, post office and shop, The Grampus; also by St Matthew's Church, by a gift/craft shop operating from the old schoolroom adjoining the church, and by the Lee Bay Hotel. As of 2009, the hotel was closed, and is being used by the police as a dog training centre.

Around the bay area are the hotel and some 10 privately owned properties. Up to the late 1980s, several of these were in use as tea rooms, restaurants and gift shops.

I walk up the hill and stop and sit on a bank to have a drink readying myself for the climb up again out of the bay.

A little further up the road and hill I turn right onto a path that leads to Damage cliffs.

The route now becomes like a roller coaster with up and downs with steps leading in and out of valleys. My legs just scream on those steps!

After a climb down some steep steps I stop to look at a bay and Outer Appledore Rocks.

The path continues up then down then up and urggh down!

I cross a bridge near Damagehue Rock.

The path zig zags back up the other side and here I meet Jon from Peaks and Trails who is leading a group of NHS staff on a walk paid for by the NHS for healthy well being. Wish my work did that!

I am now approaching Bull Point Lighthouse, Jon and his group and I leapfrog our way over the next few miles.

The original lighthouse was constructed in 1879 after a group of local "clergy, ship-owners, merchants and landowners" appealed to Trinity House for one. It was built on Bull Point, though the Maritime Corporations of the Bristol Channel seaboard had lobbied strongly for it to be placed offshore on the Morte Stone (a local hazard to shipping).

Bull Point Lighthouse was a two-storey round tower, 30 ft (9.1 m) high and 13 ft (4.0 m) wide, built of local stone and Blue Lias lime, and faced with Portland cement; it was topped by a large cylindrical lantern to give a total height of 55 feet (17 m).

In September 1972 the headland on which the lighthouse stood subsided making the structure dangerous. Trinity House used an old light tower from Braunton Sands for two years whilst a new structure was rebuilt further inland. This was completed in 1974 at a cost of £71,000 and is currently in use; much equipment was reused from the old lighthouse, including the 1960 optic and fog signal. The sector light was also retained. It was fully automated from completion, stands 11 metres tall, has a light intensity of 800,000 candelas and can be seen for 24 nmi (44 km). The triple F-type diaphone foghorn was switched off in 1988, but inside the redundant equipment remains intact. The lighthouse was automated in 1995.

 The old lighthouse keepers' cottages are now being let out to tourists as self-catering holiday establishments.

The path goes on and dips down to Rockham Bay that is now closed to the public.

The goes on up and down but not as dramatically as before, but still enough for tired legs.

I meet another walker here he had come all the way from Minnesota USA to walk this path.

Along the path I saw my first seals of the entire two days of walking. Best photos I could get with then down below the cliffs.

I now make it to Morte Point.

Morte Point (literally meaning death-point) is notorious for being the site of many shipwrecks. Five ships were wrecked in the winter of 1852 alone; Bull Point Lighthouse was built just 1¼ miles (2 km) north east of the point. One shipwreck, a ship carrying a cargo of live pigs, gave a small cove to the south of the point the name of Grunta Beach (most of the pigs survived; one is supposed to have lived wild on seaweed for a year). The Royal National Lifeboat Institution built a lifeboat station at Morte Bay in 1871, although the crews always came from the station at Ilfracombe on a carriage when the boat was needed. It proved difficult to launch into strong winds blowing onto its west-facing beach and so the station was closed in May 1900.

In the distance I get my first view of Woolacombe and my final destination.

I pass Grunta Bay so called due to a shipwreck of a ship carrying a cargo of pigs.

The sands of Woolacombe look inviting and I'm looking forward to returning in July.

I follow a steep, path straight up the hill and not following the path that goes a longer way to Woolacombe via Mortehoe. I'm so tired and don't need the extra couple of miles and climbs.

Woolacombe is a popular destination for surfing and family holidays and is part of the North Devon Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The beach has been managed by Parkin Estates Ltd since the 1970s and has over the years been recognised as one of the best beaches in Europe. It won the title of Britain's Best Beach in the "Coast Magazine Awards 2012" and was awarded the same prize of Britain's Best Beach in 2015 by TripAdvisor, also ranking in their polls as 4th in Europe and 13th best in the world. The beach water quality is monitored regularly by the Environment Agency and was rated excellent from 2016 to 2020.

I have 2 hour wait for my bus to Barnstaple so I stop for a Steak and ale pasty and a drink. Then wait at the bus stop for hours too knackered to walk about and look.

After a 10 mile walk and *** m of ascent I get the 303 bus to Barnstaple and the 310 bus from Barnstaple back to Lynton. Then just the four and a bit hour drive home.