We were back! After an absence of two and a half years we finally managed to coax our teenagers out of their bedrooms (I am sorry to say that they didn’t really emerge from their cocoons as the beautiful butterflies my wife had promised – I think they need to hibernate for a couple more years before that happens).
Given the gravitas of the occasion, various members of my family turned out in support.
And was the sun beaming to match our moods? Erm…well…no, not really. It was a little on the damp side.
And a little on the muddy side too.
This wasn’t the true Coastal Path. We were still walking alongside Chesil Beach, having opted to take the inland route through fields rather than walk along Chesil Beach itself. This is because parts of Chesil Beach are inaccessible at various times of the year due to firing ranges, nesting birds, etc. As we could not guarantee when we would come back to continue our walk we saw the best option as following the official South West Coast Path.
Still, despite the rain and the mud nothing could dampen our high spirits. Indeed, when I put my first full foot into a an unexpectedly deep and muddy puddle, and when the water spilled over the rim of my boots and soaked my socks, all I could do was smile at the sheer pleasure of being back on out Coastal Path – oh, how I had missed boots full of water (it really doesn’t take much to keep me happy).
Even better, as we got back to the cars there was a man with a pressure hose cleaning his caravan – this very kind gent agreed to give B of the ABC’s a free hose down!
Points on this walk (copy and paste the co-ordinates into Google Earth)
- Australia Road, Charlestown (start of walk): N 50° 36.853 W 002° 29.915
- Buller’s Way, Abbotsbury (end of walk): N 50° 39.561 W 002° 37.425
- Date of Walk: 4 April 2018
- Walk #86 total distance covered: 10.59 miles
- Coast of Britain Walk Total Distance Covered: 725.96 miles
- CLICK HERE FOR LINK TO INTERACTIVE MAP!!!
The Coastal Path 
So good to see your family back on the coastal path. Shame about the weather! I think you were very wise not to attempt to walk along Chesil Beach itself. The kids would never have joined you again 😄
Hi Ruth – many thanks and its good to be back. There’s no way we can walk every week like we used to but we’re planning our next leg in the summer. I’ve been following your blog and can’t believe you’re up in Scotland now and heading towards Campbeltown. I see you did Arran too. I was there a year or two ago, but for the whisky rather than the walking (though I would have liked to have done both). Good luck with that east coast Ruth – it seems to go on and on! Nic
Welcome back!
And good call for not trying to walk Chesil Beach. Even had it been accessible all the way, that’s a lot of shingle!
Thanks Ju – at the end of the walk we’ve just done we got back to the beach and had to trudge through the shingle. It was hard work, even for that small stretch. Strangely enough I found it easier to run on it rather than walk, but there’s no way I’ll do that for the full 10 miles stretch! You’ve made some great progress in the meantime. That east coast of Scotland just seems to go on and on… Nic
Yay! So happy to see you guys back!
Thanks Jill – it’s good to be back!
Glad to see that you have got the whole family ‘back on track’ Nic … albeit a pretty muddy track. I think that I might have been tempted by the shingle of Chesil Beach !
Thanks Mark – it feels good! Nic
A huge achievement (para 1, for sure!). RH
Thanks RH – two and a half years of hard effort finally paid off!
Nice to see you back. I did feel for you with the terrible wet weather over Easter. That stretch of path can be quite muddy even after dry weather, so I can imagine how bad it was after and during all that rain.
Bad but fun, JC!
Good to see you back…..hope the summer has been good 🐝