Newton Ferrers to Plymstock 19th September 2019.

This is our last day of walking from Torquay to Plymouth along the South West Coast Path. 

All our travel around the South Hams has seemed pretty complicated, particularly as the bus service is erratic at best and non-existent at worst.  After extensive research we have decided that our best option today, will be to take the 08.52 bus from Plymstock to Newton Ferrers and then return on foot to Plymstock on the eastern fringe of Plymouth.

At Plymstock we find a suitable car park and eventually track-down the bus stop for service 94 to Noss Mayo, via Newton Ferrers.

Writing notes on the bus

The streets are full of secondary school children all buying sweets for breakfast – no wonder they are hyperactive! There is a tribal element to their behaviour and dress sense – the tribal code suggests that the boys must have their shirts hanging out, whilst the girls’ shirts must be tucked in – with each of the girls sporting identical top-knots in their long hair. The boys have to act like – well – boys, whilst the girls adopt a demure and superior air.  Being an individual, as a teenager must be one of the most challenging jobs in the world!

Thankfully our single decker arrives and whisks us, plus one other passenger (a young girl), all the way to Holbeton first.  Not a single person gets on the bus. In fact we are the only people to have got on at Holbeton on either of the last two days.  Perhaps it is not needed, or more likely it is irrelevant since it does not go where people need to go or at the appropriate time.  The combined fare income generated from the three passengers on board would barely cover the cost of the diesel, let alone the driver’s pay and the cost of maintaining the bus itself.

With the driver falling behind on his timetable, he puts his foot down, somehow managing to squeeze past each and every one of the cars we meet.  Inevitably they have to reverse, as the bus can’t. I think it would drive me insane living and driving around here.

We alight at Newton Ferrers, leaving the bus to finish its journey to Noss Mayo, where we started yesterday’s walk.  True to form, Betty soon finds a public toilet, whilst I decide to case the Coop. It must be the smallest Co-op in the world, with the whole shop little bigger than our caravan.

Eventually Betty joins me and advises that the toilet gets her seal of approval – “very nice in there – old-fashioned and clean.”

From the Coop we wander down to the waterfront, passing some lovely cottages and admiring the flowers and architecture as we do.  It is surprising how well endowed with facilities Newton Ferrers is.  Besides the Co-op, it offers an estate agents, several cafes, assorted shops, toilets –  you name it – everything a heart could desire and more.  I suppose when you are pretty well cut-off from out-of-town supermarkets and the like, you have to use the local facilities that most villages in UK now no longer have.

Down by the Dolphin Inn the warm September morning sun bathes the deep blue waters of the creek.  All is tranquil until it is disturbed by a bare-chested man in a dinghy, hand on the tiller, outboard on full throttle, golden locks streaming behind him.  A minute later he returns and I wonder if he is our ferryman touting for business. I suspect he’d cetainly get Betty’s!

Noss Mayo from The Dolphin Inn, Newton Ferrers – note the bare -chested water-taxi driver in the distance! (left)

Next to the pub a notice declares “Cross to Noss Mayo via the The Voss”. This is an intriguing note and sets me wondering as to what the Voss might be.  It transpires that it is a causeway across the creek, which is revealed at low tide.  Doubtless at most states of the tide, the creek is deep enough for small boats to crisscross it, connecting up the activities of both sides.  However, at low tide it pretty-well dries out, preventing any boat movement.  The solution has been the building of this slightly elevated causeway for people to walk across at low tide from Newton Ferrers to Noss Mayo and back.

It transpires that there is a similar Voss going across the Noss Creek, which splits the Noss Mayo side in two.  A bit of further investigation reveals that the Newton Voss connects the Dolphin Inn at Newton Ferrers with the Swan Inn at Noss Mayo, whilst the Noss Voss connects the Ship Inn and the Swan Inn on the Noss Mayo side.

I think I can see the way that village life has evolved around the Voss, across both creeks.  The menfolk doubtless walk across the Voss at low tide and on finding they are unable to return to their home side, will have no option but to stay drinking in the pub until the crossing is uncovered. 

This explains why Newton Ferrers, twice the size of Noss Mayo, has a single pub, but Noss Mayo has two.  Doubtless, significant numbers of menfolk prefer to drink across the creek from their own side, thereby sustaining two pubs on the less populated Noss Mayo side, but only one on the more populous Newton Ferrers side.  I wonder how many drunken husbands have crossed the Voss in the dark, perhaps saying “I’m going to cross the Voss from Noss, don’t worry it’ll be a doss” never to been seen again?

Newton Ferrers is an incredibly peaceful village today. We have the time to wander between the old houses and admire some beautiful cottage gardens, since the ferry doesn’t start operating until 10am.  Perhaps the most striking feature at this time of year is the carpets of cyclamen that line the lane on the way to the Yealm Steps where the ferry operates.

Eventually we arrived at the ferry crossing where to my relief the ferryman is not the half –naked Adonis I spotted boating earlier.  However, he does have long grey hair and a white beard and looks like a Sixties hippie who found his calling in the South Hams. 

Business is not brisk and we are the sole customers on this crossing. In the 2 or 3 minutes it takes to whisk us across the River Yealm to the Wembury side, we learn as much from this local font of knowledge as you might expect from a London cabby.

“How do you make this worthwhile with so few customers” I ask.

“I have a contract with Devon County Council” he explains, “I have to provide the ferry service every day during the season, which ends next weekend.”

The council contract obviously subsidises his operation, with fares topping up his income to an acceptable level.  I gather he does odd-jobs and some fishing during October to March.

“Most walkers on the South West Coast Path come in the Spring.” he advises us “The weather is good for walking and all the spring flowers are out in greater numbers.”

As we get off the boat he asks Betty what she does for a living.

“I’m a hairdresser” She replies.

His reaction is identical to that of every woman who ever asks her that same question. Immediately his hands go up to his long grey locks and he says “Don’t look at mine then – I need to get it seen to soon!”

On the other side it is a mere mile or so walk to Wembury Beach, where I am immediately drawn to a modestly proportioned, modern slate building, housing the Wembury Marine Centre.  This centre is a partnership between a number of wildlife conservation and local authority organisations.  For some reason I can’t resist sticking my nose into other people’s visitor centres and discussing how they go about their business – it having been mine for 20 years.

Wembury Beach

Marine Centre

I get into conversation with one of the education staff, who explains that she works for the Devon Wildlife Trust.  Of course I have to tell her all about me and the fact that I used to work for a number of wildlife trust, as well as currently being a forest school leader.

Such is the isolated bubble in which most wildlife professionals live, that whenever two come together an immediate bond forms.  It seems that they entertain/educate children at the Marine Centre, as well as making visits to local schools themselves.  

They have many interesting display, but the Centre staff would be the first to admit that the building and its displays are but nothing compared to the wildlife to be found in the rock pools at low tide on the beach.  Wembury Beach is a mecca for rock-pooling children in the summer holidays and it is good to know that despite the IT driven age that we live in, there is still an interest in the natural world outside.  I would love to stop and talk, but we have to move on as we have many miles yet to walk.

Just down from the Marine Centre is a more ancient looking stone building which, according to one of the areas’ many well placed interpretative boards, was once a flour mill driven by a water wheel.  It is now a café and National Trust holiday cottage. 

Visitors could be forgiven for scratching their heads as to the source of the water required to drive a water wheel here, since the nearest stream is some distance away, well below the mill.  In fact the stream course would have been diverted further upstream, by the building of a channel called a mill race. 

Examination of the stream reveals that it is surprisingly small to turn an enormous steel and wooden wheel, not to mention the grinding stones.  The secret, as in the whole of South Devon, is the 100 metre fall down the Churchwood Valley to the sea.  Even a small stream falling that distance provides sufficient energ, not least because the wheel would have been overshot, with the water fed over the top via a launder, rather than just driving the bottom – as in the case of an undershot wheel. 

Information board at Wembury Mill

   

South West Coast Path mile post

After my now mandatory visit to the public toilets, so kindly provided by the good folk of South Devon, we come across a finger post which advises us there are only 424 miles to Minehead.

“Oh no,” I quip, “it’ll take us all day.” Which gets an unexpected laugh out of an elderly couple standing close-by.  We fall into conversation with them as the gentleman laments

“I always wanted to do the South West Coast Path, but now I’m retired.”

I am surprised by this admission, since my view of retirement is that it creates the opportunity to do what you always wanted to do.

I am tempted to say “You should get out there and do it as part of your bucket list,” but I restrain myself.

Instead I decide to rub more salt into the wound and declare somewhat grandly “We are walking the whole of the England and Wales Coast Path – before we end up in a box.”

This inspires me into thinking we should call our walking project “The Box Challenge”. We’ll see – hopefully we’ll overcome the challenge before the box arrives.

We leave the elderly couple behind and continue westward along the coast path as far as Wembury Point, where the former gun battery has been returned back to nature by the efforts of the National Trust.  Offshore is the impressive lump of rock called Great Mew Stone.

A couple of bird spotters have a tripod-mounted lense the size of my fore-arm, trained on something special out at sea.  I have the temerity to stand next to them and take a ‘snappy snap’ with my mobile phone.  Betty later advises me that my incursion into their territory was met by a rather sniffy look. Perhaps I should change my deodorant, or is that a typical bird spotter reaction I wonder?

Great Mew Stone from Wembury Point

Beyond Wembury Point the coast turns northward giving panoramic views across Plymouth Sound.  We are now deep into Royal Navy territory, with the entire coast here dominated by 19th Century forts, built to guard the nation’s key defensive asset (its navy) from Napoleon or anyone else casting a malevolent eye in our direction.

A mile north and we encounter yet another holiday park at Bovisand Lodge.    Its web site describes it as “tucked away in an unspoilt wooded valley which opens out onto a long sandy beach. Yet all the conveniences of Plymouth’s city centre lie just six miles away”.  By now we feel that we are leaving the tranquility of The South Hams, in exchange for an increasingly urban landscape.

We stop here for lunch on a well-placed bench overlooking Plymouth Sound.

Betty waxes lyrical, saying “this is the nicest view so far.” 

I have to concur that the views are spectacular, but there has been so much competition all along the South Hams coastline this last 2 weeks, that I am unsure which one is my favourite.

Panoramic view of Plymouth Sound.

The urban whiteness of Plymouth lurks centre right.

Beyond Crownhill Bay a collection of green boxes suggests we will have to pass an internment camp, within which I suspect ‘holiday prisoners’ dwell, in their budget end of the market static caravans.  I suspect someone is coining a few bob, but couldn’t they use a bit of imagination regarding the colour?  Someone in authority probably decided green paint would camouflage best, but the overall effect is actually depressing.  A few bright colours are surely acceptable?

As we approach Fort Bovisand, the coast path is forced to climb yet again, up Lord knows how many steps to Staddon Fort at the top. Fort Bovisand was first created in the 1860s to protect the British Fleet at Plymouth.  It continued to do this job for almost another 100 years before being decommissioned.  Most of its life since has been as a diving school, but many of the ventures struggled financially.  Currently it is being advertised as a residential development.

Hot and puffing by the time we reach the top, the path takes us across a bridge over a deep cutting in the cliff.  The cutting looks like the sort a funicular railway might slot into.  I suspect it could have been a similar structure, allowing ammunition to be moved up and down an inclined plane. The climb continues until at the top there is a radar installation which we are told we could have visited, were not for vandalism having led to its closure.  This is a sure sign that we are close to a city.

Once at the top of the cliff, we continue with level walking along a hawthorn lined path, thankful for the shade provided.  Then we plunge down through lush woodland, which covers the cliff right down to the sea.  Several large coppice ash stools lurk beside the path, one in particular looking like an inverted octopus.  Even in this isolated location ash dieback is obvious in its branches. This disease of ash trees was merely a threat 5 or 10 years ago.  Since then most of the ash trees in the British Isles have now succumbed to it.

A Veteran ash and a veteran walker – both face perils. The ash is diseased, the walker is er.. a veteran

Betty being careful not to slide down the steps!

A young couple coming from the opposite direction obviously spot that we are old and decrepit. 

They warn us that “The descent ahead is hairy, but you should be ok.”  

My first thought is “Patronizing bastards!”  But I am sure they are acting out of kindness.

In fact they are right – it is a difficult descent, caused by a rockfall just above some steps.  It seems the local rock is not as sound as we have become accustomed to.  More to the point, it is eating into the busy road above us.

Eventually we come out at Admirals Hard, where a stone set in the ground implores us to wipe our feet.

The ‘door-mat’ to Plymouth – who say’s public servants have no sense of humour?

Beyond we enter Admiral’s Hard, an area of suburban parkland occupied by sun-bathing girls and ball-chasing dogs.  In keeping with everything else we have seen lately, it too looks like a former gun emplacement. 

As we move into industrial Plymouth we quickly realise that we are no longer in the South Hams.  The Coast Path here religiously follows the edge of the sea, but for the most part it is uninspiring stuff.  Every kind of marine industry occupies almost every square metre of land  – and a large proportion of the water too.  It is therefore something of a surprise when we find ourselves circumnavigating Hooe Lake – a small muddy inlet from Plymouth Sound. 

I can find no real history of this site, so it seems it was never an important docks area.  I suspect the lake was always too shallow for shipping.  Today it is used as a graveyard for some rotting hulks and is designated as an important wildlife site. 

The remains of a railway bridge and some disused quarries indicate that this area was once an important site for limestone extraction, probably for the manufacture of concrete, of which there is a large amount in the city and port of Plymouth.

An embankment crosses the far end of Hooe Lake, separating the salt water of the lake from the freshwater Radford Lake, which is fed by a small stream.  A 19th Century folly, known as Radford Castle stands on the embankment.

The tidal Hooe Lake

Radford Castle a 19th Century Folly

At this point we say goodbye to The South West Coast Path, which winds its way along the seafront of Plymouth before crossing the Taymar into Cornwall.  We in turn head up through the park to our car, as the school children we encountered this morning erupt along paths, and across the grass.  I know which of us had the more interesting day.  Their time will come, but for now it is we oldies who are getting the most out of the Devon sunshine.

We hope to return before too long and continue following the South West Coast Path through Cornwall before returning to Devon along its northern coast.