Walking the South West Coast Path: From Shell Bay to Dancing Ledge
This week's blog post is on my shenanigans walking the South West Coast Path again, in particular covering the two days we did walking from Shell Bay to Swanage, then from Dancing Ledge to Swanage.
Whilst it has been a bit of a while since I walked these, I thought I'd take the time to post a bit about the coast path around the Swanage area, at the start point, which is just west of the chain link ferry that takes you across the mouth of the Poole harbour, to Dancing Ledge which is an amazing part of the world. The videos can be found below, or click for day 1 and day 2 on YouTube, respectively.
Day 1: Shell Bay to Swanage
Contrary to the Minehead end of the path, which we have also started from (see video here), this part of the path isn't surrounded by a town, nor a big monument. There's a National Trust car park, a restaurant, the ferry toll booths and a small sailing club. You can either park at the car park and drop a car off in Swanage, or opt to take the Purbeck Breezer (bus 50) from the Swanage bus station to the stop just before the ferry crossing.
The start of the path is across the beach to the south of the car park, and you begin by walking along the beach continuously until you reach Middle Beach. This part of the path passes through one of the few nudist beaches in the south, before heading past Knoll Beach and towards South Beach.
There's a Café and toilets at Knoll Beach, with a large car park too. Knoll beach is one of the most popular and therefore busy beaches on the Isle of Purbeck, I think largely due to the depth of the beach (Middle and South Beach are really quite narrow), the all-day sunshine, and the lack of any stinky seaweed.
Once you leave the beach at Middle Beach, the coast path takes you up towards a WW2 era fort, built in 1943 to protect this part of the coast from attacks. This was also where they tested the release of oil into the sea through various underwater pipes, then setting it on fire to prevent enemy attack. This part of the path gives good views over towards Bournemouth and towards the Isle of Wight.
Once you pass this part, the path diverts inland slightly and passes the Bankes Arms. This is a pub with a very generous beer garden, serving a wide variety of local ales and a good selection of your traditional pub grub. If you're a keen reader of this blog, you might remember my reference to The Pig at Harlyn Bay (near Padstow), when I detailed that aspect of the coast path in a previous post. The Pig is a small chain, with a few restaurants dotted around the south, and it is on this part of the path that you'll find another of their establishments.
After passing the Bankes Arms, you head down a hill, where until a few years ago, you would turn left and continue down to South Beach. Unfortunately, due to land movements, the National Trust have now been forced to divert the path slightly inland, so you'll be walking not-so-coastal for a little longer.
Once past this minor diversion, you start to head southwards towards the Old Harry Rock peninsula, with a wide path that caters to both walkers and cyclists. When we walked it, the military seemed to be doing some sort of training exercise on top, which was quite interesting to watch. At the end of this easy walk out, you reach the top of Old Harry Rock, where if you're feeling brave and stupid, you can even walk out onto (at least a bit).
From there, you turn right, and begin to head uphill to a trigpoint with a great view, before the path becomes enclosed to one side by a fence, and narrowly follows the cliff face towards Swanage. At this point, you can see the entirety of the Swanage bay, and also a massive cairn on Swanage Beach. The path then begins a steepish descent and spits you out at the far end of the beach.
From here, it's easy walking along the promenade and into Swanage, where you can stop for an amazing gelato at the Swanage Beach Kiosk, or possibly some fish and chips at the Fish Plaice. If you fancy a drink, there's a quiet bar with wonderful sea views at The Mowlem Theatre, called The Showbar.
In Swanage, there's a substantial Co-op which is good for stocking up on small bits and pieces, and the Swanage Railway Station, which is a small heritage railway that runs from Norden (just north of Corfe Castle) and terminates at Swanage.
For parking in Swanage, I normally go for the Broad Road Car Park, as this puts you reasonably close to the action, and also close to a favourite of mine, Peveril Point. From the car park you can see the pier, and there is a good view over to Old Harry Rock, Bournemouth, and the Isle of Wight. We decided that the walk from Shell Bay to Swanage was about right for a day's relaxed walk, and we took a van into Swanage, then took the Purbeck Coaster bus to Shell Bay to start the walk.
Day 2: Dancing Ledge to Swanage
For the second day's walking, we then went from Dancing Ledge and round into Swanage, as we had camped at Tom's Field Campsite in Langton Matravers, and wanted to finish in Swanage again, as opposed to the campsite.
From the campsite it's probably between 1 and 2 miles before you join the coast path, so if using that as your base don't forget to factor that into your walking calculations. Dancing Ledge itself is an absolute gem, and comprises two large plateau areas, the upper one of which is extensively used for climbing, and the lower which provides access to the sea.
This part of the coast, from Durlston Head all the way along to Kimmeridge Bay comprises hard rocky cliffs and is steeply shelved and has to be one of my favourite parts of the UK's coastline. At Dancing Ledge, there's also a couple of small caves that you can clamber through if you want to experience some really easy caving, as there's no tight spots and you can't get lost.
Dancing Ledge is also home to a small sea water plunge pool, which was blasted out with dynamite at some point in the past, meaning you can still take a dip even if the sea might be a bit choppy. It's well worth a stop if you can spare the time, just remember to pack some swimming trunks and be careful, as there's no phone signal for emergencies.
As you wonder along the coast path from Dancing Ledge towards Durlston Country Park, you encounter a few "mile marker" towers, which together create a line through the two points that mariners can use to measure from one to the next. Although I can't find much on these online, I'd assume that a boat can time itself from one set to the next and see how accurate their speed gauges are? If you know better than me, please leave a comment!
Past the first couple of these mile markers, you'll encounter the Anvil Point Lighthouse, which is quite short as lighthouses go, and doesn't have a fog signal. It's remotely operated and runs an LED light, so nothing of interest here really. From this point, you start to head down towards Tilly Whim caves, which were closed to the public in 1976 due to rock falls, and now house many bats.
Once past these caves, you are firmly within Durlston Country park, walking past The Great Globe, which is one of the largest stone spheres in the world, and funnily enough is classes as a Grade II listed building, despite not being a building itself.
After Durlston park, the coast path skirts around various flats and houses, until it emerges at the top of The Downs, which is the park the aforementioned Swanage Car Park is located in. From here, it is tempting to cut-off Peveril Point, but it's well worth heading to the end as there are some good views to be had.
That concludes the coast path experience from the start at Shell Bay, through towards Dancing Ledge. Check back for a future instalment, where I'll be detailing Kimmeridge Bay, Lulworth Cove and Ranges, and further along as I edit the videos and complete more of the coast path.