Walking the South West Coast Path from Torquay

View across Torbay 

One of our main considerations when choosing Torquay as our new base was the availability of great walking routes near to our home. We had already tried a few rambles on Dartmoor when we were here in the Spring, but only managed one short coastal wander. We're rectifying that now and have been on a couple of good walks directly from our front door out along sections of the wonderful South West Coast Path and back home again. All car free so far which is great and we are also enjoying simply exploring the streets up around Wellswood, the Lincombes and St Marychurch. There is so much interesting architecture and green expanses that I don't think we will be getting bored walking around here any time soon!

Our first coastal wander took us out past the Imperial Hotel near Torquay harbour to join the Coast Path. We were actually directed through part of their car park! Once onto the Path proper, there are gorgeous views out to sea and across Torbay. It's all pretty easy going underfoot, albeit with steep step sections, so I imagine the Path can be walked at all times of the year to appreciate the differing colours and moods of the sea. We continued as far as Daddyhole Plain which is a limestone plateau 75 metres above the sea. Apparently Daddyhole is an ancient name for the devil and Kevin Dixon wrote an interesting article for the Torquay Herald Express about Daddyhole Plain's folklore. The only sort of unusual thing we saw up there was this stone bench created by the National Association of Master Masons in 1984.

NAMM stone bench on Daddyhole Plain 

Further walking, now fortunately downhill, took us to Meadfoot Beach which is considered one of the nicer swimming areas. The tide was in though so the beach was mostly a concrete promenade. Fortified and refreshed by locally made Marshfield Farm ice cream, we headed home following an almost hidden uphill path which began a little way along Meadfoot Beach, about in the middle of the parking layby. We ascended through pleasantly shaded woodland, emerging eventually in the Lincombes and near to home.

View across Torbay