Monday, 29 November 2021

Tales from Wales #6 :: A Walk on the Beach

Hi there everyone 😀

Whilst we were away in Pembrokshire our holiday weather seemed to be settling into a bit of a theme … a wet and windy day, followed by a day of blue skies and sunshine.

Having had a lovely day out on Thursday exploring Barafundle Bay and The Stackpole Estate, our next real trip out was on Sunday. We were hoping to visit St Govan's Chapel. I’d done my homework and checked the firing times on the Castlemartin training area and there was no firing planned for the weekend.

We were really looking forward to seeing the Chapel and our hearts pretty much fell through our boots when we hit the road block and red flag. I knew there was definitely no firing planned so rang the number displayed to see what was going on … the recorded message confirmed that I was right … no firing … however, access to the coast was closed anyway. We were both gutted as it was the only non- firing day there was before we were due to head for home so St Govan's chapel was definitely off the cards.

Oh well,… it was a swift about turn and back to the National Trust car park at Broadhaven, where we thought we would have a short walk out along the cliffs … which we did.

The views were spectacular ...






Whilst we were messing about trying to get a decent selfie ... 
... a very kind gentleman offered to take a picture for us ...

Having seen how beautiful the beach looked we had the crazy notion that it would be nice to walk across the beach and up to the bottom of the lily ponds. I think it would be fair to say that this was a fairly challenging walk for Martin on his crutches, but it was such a lovely day and the beach was so beautiful that we stuck with it …


At one point it did look like we could be in for a bit of a deluge ... but it soon passed ...

It wasn't actually long before we were at the bottom of the lily ponds ...
.. where Martin had a bit of a breather whilst I went to have a look at the view of the lily ponds from their bottom end …

We found some pretty impressive fungi …

... before opting to make our way back through the sand dunes …


… which meant we didn’t have to go up quite as many steps as we had gone down on our way out ...
We stopped at the top for one last look at the view ...
... before making our way back to Garden Pitts via Cresswell Quay, where we’d noticed some stepping stones across the river earlier on … no sign of them now though … and not sure I would be following the public’s footpath sign today 😂

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Friday, 26 November 2021

Tales from Wales #5 :: Barafundle Bay & The Stackpole Estate

Hi there everyone 😀

I know it feels like an age ago ... but I've got the latest from our September fortnight's break in Pembrokeshire to share with you today ...

After another really wet day on Thursday we were forecast blue skies and wall to wall sunshine for Friday so we were on for another big day out … this time we were heading back over towards Bosherston, where we wanted to explore more of the National Trust’s Stackpole estate.

We started off at Stackpole Quay …

… where they may have been a pasty from the cafe for breakfast …

We were hoping to make the walk to Barafundle Bay … though we weren’t really sure if Martin would be able to manage the terrain on his crutches.

There were a few steps up to get us into the coastal path …
… but once up top the going was nice and steady with a few gentle ups and downs but nothing too challenging …

Though at first we couldn’t see the beach we were heading for there were some glorious views out over the sea … on what really was the most beautiful of days …

Once over the last hump in the path Barafundle Bay was revealed and it is a really stunning beach … framed by the old estate wall …

It really was a lovely spot to sit and take it all in … we didn’t actually walk down to the beach but took a slow wander back along the clifftop ... taking in the views ...


We headed back through the gate, down the steps and back to jump back in the car and head for a spot where we hoped we might be able to get a look at the Estate's Eight Arch Bridge without too much of a walk ...

Our first stop gave us this as a view …
On our second we walked down to get up really close and personal …

It was worth the effort ... the views were just lovely ...



… though it was a bit of a slog back up ...
By now it was time for lunch so we opted for the cafe in the walled garden where we had pea and potato soup with crusty bread … and very tasty it was too.

We did have a wander round the walled garden and there were still a few splashes of colour …

… and interesting sculptures to be found …
We’d had another really lovely day. We'd managed to walk about 8000 steps, though not all in one go, but well above our target of 2000 … and we were both starting to feel so called time and headed back to Garden Pitts.

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