South Walk: Cremyll to Portwrinkle

Sunday 12th April: It was another beautiful morning in Cremyll, where I was staying at the Edgcumbe Arms. After the usual Bacon and Egg energy boost, I started on the path for the walk to Portwrinkle -which was about 13 miles away. The pub was literally on the path, being right next to the Ferry Point which was also a Bus stop, so it was ideal and I would get the bus back later that afternoon.

The path immediately entered the Mount Edgcumbe Country Park with superb views of the main house at the top of a tree lined grassy hill. It then went through the Orangery set in beautiful gardens at their best in the early morning sun, and then an ornamental lake, before eventually entering a woodland and meandered at high level with views across the Sound. The woodland area and gardens seemed a bit neglected, but the Estate is now owned jointly by Plymouth Council and Cornwall County, so perhaps that explains why.

After a while, I descended out of the woods and left the Park heading for the seaside villages of Kingsand and Cawsand. Kingsand used to be part of Devon until 1844 and both villages have a long history of smuggling. Cawsand was particularly attractive with narrow side streets and interesting old properties. If it hadn't still been early, it would have been a nice place to stop, but I pressed on. It was a steep climb out of Cawsand up onto the clifftops heading first for Penlee Point and then Rame Head which I would subsequently be able to see for many, many miles ahead. The Official path passed right by Rame Head itself, which is often the case, but I made the detour up to the top where there was the ruins of a small Chapel and far reaching views back eastwards to Bolt Tail near Salcombe and my final destination westwards, The Lizard.

Once you are around Rame Head, you enter the long curve of Whitsand Bay which goes all the way to my day's final destination Portwrinkle. It was a nice walk from Rame Head down to the small cove of Polhawn. There were plenty of other walkers about, Rame Head had a nearby car park, so was obviously a popular day out. The first couple of miles of Whitsand Bay were fairly rocky - and the path winds along the cliffs through an area dotted with chalets. Although in great positions overlooking the Bay, they seemed very difficult to get to. For a while the path went along the main road behind the cliffs passing Whitsand Bay Holiday Park. This was obviously an ideal area for Para Gliding - and there was about 6 of them trying hard to launch themselves into the up currents.

Shortly after passing through a small place called Freathy the path headed inland and around a large military rifle range called Tregantle.

In fact, as firing was not taking place, I was able to take an alternative path through the range with great views down the long sandy bay of Long Sands nnd across the whole of Whitsand Bay! Tregantle Fort was part of the range and had been adapted for military accommodation.

It was not much further to Portwrinkle, and I got there about 2:00pm. I considered carrying on, but in the end, I was lured up to the small village of Crafthole where my bus would depart from. I had 40 minutes to wait, so headed for an inviting looking pub, The Finnygook Inn where I was just in luck - they had ONE Roast dinner left ( what's the name of thsi blog!!) Unfortunately they had run out of yorkshire puddings but you can't have everything. I sat outside - and an elderly couple near me proceeded to leave virtually their entire roast dinners and left their table. I was ravenous, and my dinner had hardly touched the sides - was it socially acceptable to grab their plates and help myself - ooh, I came so close.... in fact when the waitress collected the plates a few other drinkers in the beer garden joked about it. I think they had been unhappy about the vegetables - they were a bit crunchy, but good for your bowels no doubt!

Suitably refreshed, I hung around for a bus which NEVER arrived. I even asked one of the locals who was tending her front garden - she didn't know really, but offered to make me a cup of tea! - how kind was that, I said "No thanks, get me a can of Lager" In the end, after phoning Traveline - I decided to walk back towards Cremyll on the main road - and ended up doing another 6 miles to get to Millbrook where I finally caught a bus back to the Edgcumbe Arms.

Another day's walk over - I headed back over the Torpoint Ferry and rejoined the A38 back towards Uffculme.