SWCP: North Devon Roadtrip

My fascination with the SWCP started while we were living in New Zealand and that partially led us to move to Cornwall when we moved back to the UK. That wasn’t the only reason, but it was one of the reasons. Other reasons were desire to live somewhere more rural, closer to nature and especially closer to the sea. The temperate climate was also a factor and my fondness of palm trees, despite them not being indigenous to Cornwall. On couple of trips to Cornwall prior to moving here, we walked small sections of the path and after moving to Cornwall we started actively walking more of the sections here in Penwith.

Penwith sections can be tough walking and I was wondering if it’s the same on other parts of the path. This led me to book an impromptu roadtrip to the start (or the end) of the path in Minehead with the idea of driving back down the Atlantic Highway, the beautiful A39 while stopping to look at the parts of the path.

We drove up to Minehead from Hayle. We made the mistake of trusting Google for some shortcuts and ended up spending way too much time driving small country roads which made the trip longer, rather than faster. Either take the A30 & A39 or A30 & M5, those are your best options. Anything else will be just annoying zigzagging across the county.

We set off in the morning and after a few hours, we arrived in Minehead. We had a walk on the promenade in search of the starting point of SWCP. We started walking from Butlins end of the promenade towards the southern end. Eventually we found it.

From Minehead we started driving down the A39 and soon enough we were treated to wonderful views of the Devon coast. We saw a rest area by the side of the road on top of a hill and parked there for a bit to have a look. It was a hill overlooking the Porlock Beach on one side and the moors on the other.

We had booked a B'n’b for the night in Lynton. Before reaching Lynton, we stopped for another time to admire the views. Lynmouth just around the corner.

We stayed at Chough's Nest Hotel, which is one of the white houses you see on the hillside in the photo above. It’s right next to the path with some lovely views overlooking the sea.

The next day we left the car back at the hotel and had a walk around Lynton before having a walk on the path. Lynton is just around the Valley of the Rocks and the path leading there is very nice to walk. Initially it’s tarmac and later it turns into a wide gravel path.

After a short walk we reached Valley of the Rocks and its famous wild goats. Goats are hanging out on the left side of the hill.

We returned to the car and took the smaller road that passes Valley of the Rocks to continue our car journey alongside the path. The road was a typical country lane, mostly single lane and we were pretty lucky not to come across many cars on that bit. We followed the road to our next destination, Ilfracombe, where we stayed at the Carlton hotel. The room was fairly small, a bit stuff and noisy.

The following morning we had a walk around Capstone Hill. I wasn’t particularly impressed about Ilfracombe, so we continued our journey towards Cornwall.

Our next stop was Clovelly village, which was surprisingly busy considering that the we had only come out of the lockdown a month earlier. Here’s a quick video of walking the famous road down to the village.

While Clovelly is beautiful and we saw tuna swimming in the harbour, it all felt a bit too busy and touristy for my liking. We had a quick coffee and headed out again. Next stop was Hartland Quay. As you can see in the photo on the right, Hartland was 7.5mi from Clovelly, but as we had a car, we’d drive there.

Hartland Quay has a large parking are and a hotel, and it was pretty busy again.

The photo is from around the corner from Well Beach.

Well Beach has some unusual formations of sedimentary rock.

Well Beach from the other side.

This was our last stop on our way back home. It was a whistle stop tour North Devon, but well worth it. So much to see and admire. It would be worth to take a few days and drive down from Minehead all the way to West Penwith and stop at the beauty spots along the way. It’s not as immersive as walking the path, but allows those pressed for time to soak up as much of the salty air of the path.