The Caravan Has Legs

Caravan diaries 17.2

Now that Z has her new hip and can do level walking at least as well as I can, I decided a couple of outings were in order.  The first was Lydstep Head, which is a fairly gentle circular mile with great views south and east across to Caldey Island, west towards Manorbier and the wilder coast beyond and, in the last stretch, downwards to what’s now called Lydstep Haven. 

Once upon a time one went (or was taken, to be exact) to this uninspiring shingle beach for a sole purpose – to walk, at the lowest tide, round to the spectacular caves that must, now I think of it, be more or less underneath where we were walking.  Now it’s been turned into a very expensive caravan site, the entrance to which has been made to look like private property (which it isn’t of course, there are no private beaches in this country).  I’ve never driven down to it, but from above it looks horrible.  The walk is lovely, though, and the flowering gorse smelt as coconutty as always.

The other big walk was to Bosherstone.  This is an entirely man-made stretch of lakes created by an obviously mad 18^th century aristocrat to grow waterlilies in, and now owned and curated by the National Trust.  (I know they have their faults, but imagine the country without them!) 

The car park at Bosherstone village being full, we drove round to Broadhaven beach and did the walk from there.  This was not so good, as it involved a long stretch over the beach; walking on soft sand, especially up a hill of it, is tough on the legs, heart and lungs.  But we made it back to the car, the village and the Govan Arms for lunch.  I was pleased to see that the scenic cameos my friend Graham Hurd-Wood had painted in his youth were still hanging on the wall.

On our last day, we’d intended to leave first thing, but the weather was so great that we delayed and instead went to Colbey Woodland Garden, another local NT property.  The garden is fine – what it says on the label, more or less – but they do need to have a look at their signage: I won’t bore you with details, let’s just say that if you have a ‘red’ walk on the map, a few red signposts along the way might help…