Path People - With The Elements

With the elements

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The horizon. Blue-grey, changing under shafts of light from a moody sky above, sheets of rain coming in, a place where the sun rises in a watery pink or sinks in a blaze of golden glory. Clifftops alive with colour under an intense sun, or battered by storms, winds raging, hailstones driving hard to the ground...

Words by Stephanie Boon

Elemental. This is the South West Coast Path that I love. It’s where I go to feel alive, ease my mind, and feel the expansiveness I only ever find there. It’s a feeling that goes deep into my bones.

I’ve solo hiked all 630 miles, but Falmouth is where I fell in love with it when I was a student at Falmouth School of Art. The section of path between Falmouth and Helford Passage was, simply, home.

The 1978 shipwreck The Ben Asdale was a vast, seemingly indestructible trawler lying broken against the rocks at Maenporth, but it’s virtually disappeared before my eyes over the last 40 years. WW2 relics line the coast, with perhaps the most poignant on the beach at Polgwidden at the bottom of Trebah Garden: a concrete jetty where the US army embarked for the Normandy Landings.

Nearby is the tiny fishing village of Durgan, a cluster of stone cottages at the bottom of another famous garden: the National Trust’s Glendurgan. Carry on round to Helford Passage and there you reach the ferry to the other side of the Helford River, which seemed like the entry to another world. But it wasn’t really the history of people that drew me along this section of the coast; it was, and still is, the natural world, the liminal stretch of path between the familiar and the unknown. The constant back and forth of the tide, the changing light, the twisted ancient oak woodland near Mawnan, the carpets of bluebells in spring, the spires of foxgloves, paths down to low-tide beaches...it’s always and never the same.

Cornwall boasts almost half the South West Coast Path, but it’s mostly the north coast on the Atlantic Ocean that has that elemental feel I crave. And my go-to cliffs to experience it near home are between Perranporth and Chapel Porth near St Agnes. It’s an easy 7 miles, compared to a little further along between Porthtowan and Portreath with its steep climbs. Still, it’s easy to reach by bus at either end (so long as you’re prepared to walk a little further up the cliffs at Chapel Porth, and maybe over St Agnes Beacon with its spectacular views over the north coast from Padstow to St Ives, and into St Agnes village itself).

This section might be relatively level (excepting Trevellas), but it doesn’t come without risk. >

There are places along the way here that are about as close to a cliff edge as you can get and not somewhere you want to be in winter storms. I’ve literally been pinned to the ground by gale-force winds and hail storms like I’ve never experienced anywhere else. But for me, it’s this wildness that brings me here again and again. It makes me feel small and insignificant in the context of geological time. Still, it’s reassuring that what I’m looking at, experiencing, will continue with voracity whatever else we do to this planet of ours.

The geology along this section of the coast is extraordinary. The vast outcrop of layered rock at Cligga Head hints at mining tunnels below and is where you can see adits in the red iron-stained cliffs. But it’s the magnificent rocks of Hanover Cove that stop me in my tracks every time. They jut out into the sea in white, knifed-edged sheets inaccessible from the cliffs, the preserve of sea birds.

Further along, there’s a place I sit to watch over Green Island, magical in a sparkling turquoise sea in summer. And when I look down at the gulls gliding below, I feel like a bird on the wing myself.

This whole stretch builds to a finale at Chapel Porth, where there’s nothing more grounding than watching huge waves roll into the narrow cove in winter or walking along the surf at low tide as the sun sinks behind the cliffs.

Ultimately, the coast path, for me, is about spending time alone, whether it’s local walks or hiking long sections. Wild and remote places like sections of the north Devon and Cornwall coasts or parts of the Jurassic Coast in Dorset fill me with wonder and peace. And the physical and mental challenges I deal with on my own help me build resilience and bolster what’s sometimes very fragile self-esteem (due to recurrent depression).

I believe anyone can reap the benefits of hiking and walking on the coast path, though, so I trained as a Lowland Leader with the Mountain Training organisation to encourage that. It means I’m qualified to safely take groups out or guide hikers along the trail (and elsewhere in lowland Britain) to introduce them to places they might not otherwise explore. I do it ad hoc to raise funds for the South West Coast Path Association and give back a little to the charity that makes walking the path possible. Next year though, my plan is to do it more regularly. Until then, you might bump into me stomping along the cliffs of the north Cornish coast or back in Falmouth where it all began. I hope to see you out there.

Stephanie is a solo hiker, writer and artist based in Cornwall who’s suffered depression since her teenage years. She’s currently hiking the UK’s national trails (the first one she completed was the South West Coast Path, of course!) and making art about her experiences along the way.

She blogs about hiking in the UK on her website 10milehike.com, where she’s also building a library of stories and tips from solo women hikers around the UK (called Women Afoot), many of whom have hiked the South West Coast Path.