Martin earning his cream tea, scones, and a well deserved rest along the South West Coast Path.
Every so often a note lands in our inbox that we want to read twice. This one came from a hiker just home from a multi-day stretch of the South West Coast Path with Hillwalk Tours written with the kind of detail you only get from someone who slowed down enough to really see a place. It captures exactly why this corner of Cornwall gets under your skin and stays with you. Whether you’d rather take it slowly on one of our Gentle hikes or cover a little more ground each day on a Moderate hike, the magic Martin describes is waiting on every step of the trail. Read on for a flavour of what a hike on the South West Coast Path has to offer.
A coast that changes by the hour
The scenery, Martin wrote, was “the star of the show” and it’s easy to see why. Up on the cliff-tops, he found “a landscape blooming in shades of yellow, blue, and pink with gorse, foxgloves, and primroses.” He was struck that “plants that in Germany are found only as small summer or houseplants grow wild here, some reaching several meters in height.”
Then the ground falls away. “Rugged cliffs sometimes black, sometimes red alternate with kilometer-long, hundreds-of-meters-wide sandy beaches and dunes many meters high, covered in the finest sand.” On a good day you’ll share those beaches with “a host of surfers, kiteboarders, and yes even the occasional hardy swimmer who jumps into the 14-degree ‘warm’ water.”
The sea does its own thing entirely. Martin watched “the water shimmer from dark blue to turquoise,” with waves that rise “as high as a house” against the rock before flowing “back, foaming white,” all under “a white-and-blue sky.” And the weather? He wouldn’t have it any other way. “You should enjoy the wind,” he wrote, “and you shouldn’t shy away from the occasional short but intense rain shower, followed by sunshine. But that only enhances your immersion in nature!”
Two surfers riding breaking waves in the sea off the South West Coast Path in Cornwall.
The locals: seals, soaring crows, and one very bold seagull
You quickly realise you’re not the only one who loves it out here. Sheep stand in the gusts getting windswept new hairstyles, seals lounge on the rocks, and gulls ride the updraughts along the cliffs, sometimes hanging motionless in the air just a few metres from your shoulder. Which brings us to our favourite line in the whole note:
“If you’re leisurely munching on your sandwich, you can often get a much closer look at the birds for a moment before they take off again with the sandwich in their beaks.”
Consider yourself warned. Elsewhere along the path the crows put on a show, soaring and diving down the cliff faces while one older bird watches the whole thing like a flight instructor. Rabbits duck into the gorse and now and then a horse or a cow leans over a stone wall to see who’s coming along.
A hillside blushing pink with sea thrift in full bloom.
A coastline that remembers
There’s history woven through every mile here too. Cornwall spent centuries mining tin, copper and tungsten, and the coast, Martin noted, is “dotted with mines often only faintly recognizable, but mostly well-secured mine shafts,” alongside “the remains of former mine buildings with their narrow, towering architecture and often ornate, decorated chimneys.” Those chimneys once housed the steam engines “needed to pump water out of the tunnels, some of which extended far beneath the sea.”
Then, more sobering, the remnants of World War II defences which Martin described as standing “like a raised index finger,” a quiet warning “against repeating such mistakes.” It’s the kind of layering that turns a walk into something closer to a conversation with the landscape.
The remains of a Cornish mine engine house standing sentinel above the sea.
Why it all felt so effortless
Here’s the thing about a walk like this: the scenery is only restful if nothing else is nagging at you. That’s the part we take to heart. Martin described the trip as “perfectly organized,” praising “the wonderful little lodgings, an absolutely warm welcome, and a breakfast that provided plenty of energy for each day’s hike.”
Then there’s the bag you never have to carry: luggage transport Martin called “completely reliable,” moving on ahead while you walk light. And the route notes, which he singled out as “extremely comprehensive tour materials,” including “detailed descriptions of the route, possible alternatives, and points of interest, right down to recommendations for restaurants and pubs.” It’s the difference between simply following a path and actually understanding the place you’re walking through.
The part we can’t put in a brochure
We can plan the beds, move the bags and write the notes. What happens out on the path is yours and our walker captured it better than any marketing line we could write:
“Anyone who walks this trail will forget the world and immerse themselves in nature. Worries, stress and the hustle and bustle fall away. You hike feeling relaxed and content, and are surprised to find yourself ‘already’ at your destination even though, looking back, the starting point seems so far away.”
That’s the feeling we’re really in the business of, creating the kind of experiences where you leave the business of everyday life far behind you for a while. And the closing line of the note told us everything we needed to know about whether the trip landed it wasn’t a complaint, but a request for more:
“Please offer a few more sections of the Coastal Trail. Who else am I supposed to turn to? ;-)”
We’re busy expanding our collection of trails right now. We’re currently adding new Portugal walking routes including a Lisbon & Sintra-Cascais Natural Park and a Porto and Douro Valley trail through the terraced vineyards alongside new extensions to the Pembrokeshire Coast Path in Wales. And there’s more on the way: we’ll be announcing several brand-new trails across 2027 and 2028, so keep an eye on the website.
Fishing boats hauled up on the slipway in a quiet Cornish cove.
Come walk it
If this is the kind of slowing-down you’ve been needing, the South West Coast Path is waiting wildflowers, sea spray, sandwich-thieving gulls and all. We’ll handle the planning so you can do the only part that matters out there: look up, breathe out, and keep walking.
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