Nine Mile Walk from Withypool to the Rock House Inn, Dulverton, via Hawkridge

This is not a circular walk. To return to the starting point entails catching the 401 bus, which travels between Bampton and Lynmouth twice a day, on Wednesdays and Sundays only, from 29th July to the 27th September

This is the antithesis of the walk from Withypool to Dulverton, found elsewhere on this site. Then we had walked to Tarr Steps along the Barle valley before taking to the heights of the Ashway road to Marsh Bridge. This time we kept above the river past Hawkridge until we joined the Barle where it meets the Danesbrook at Castle Bridge. If you are a dedicated valley walker, you would be best advised to walk to Tarr Steps along the valley before crossing the river and climbing up to Hawkridge via the track to Parsonage Farm. You can’t keep with the river all the way from Withypool to Dulverton, but this would allow you to do so as much as possible.
We took the road out of Withypool which passes the village hall on the left. It’s a stiff climb, but it soon levels out before arriving at the cattle grid at Greystone Gate. The view to the left was of Winsford Hill, darkening in a piercing north easterly wind.

If you fancy climbing Withypool Hill and finding the Stone Circle, as many walkers do, take the sheep path on the right almost opposite to the cattle grid and lane which leads down to Batsom Farm. When you reach the top of the Hill, to find the Circle, take the path which runs almost due south. Don’t expect an Exmoor Stonehenge or Avebury. If you blink, you’ll miss the stones lying flat in the heather.
We kept on the road from Greystone Gate until over the bridge at Westwater Farm and then turned left through a gate into the bridle way. The next gate on the track is straight ahead of you, from which we took the path which winds up through ragged gorse and thorn trees. The sun broke through as we climbed, rewarding us with a splendid view back to Withypool Hill.

The track led straight on through several fields before turning sharp right, as it meets a path coming up from Tarr Steps. A couple of gates takes you into the buildings of Parsonage Farm, and then the farm lane leads you down and then up to a point where various paths diverge at the foot of the road coming down from Tarr Post. We went straight on through the gate to take the path to Hawkridge, which provided views over towards Ashway Farm as we approached the village.

We walked down into the village, past the workshop of Tom Lock, who makes all sorts of wondrous artefacts from antlers, to the little church, which still holds weekly services. Ernest Bawden, the legendary huntsman of the Devon & Somerset Staghounds, is buried in the churchyard. Despite its tiny size, Hawkridge also boasts a splendidly appointed village hall.

Leaving the church on our right, we took the track which leads straight on and out on to Hawkridge Ridge. To begin with the track is sheltered by banks and beech hedges but, when it opens out, there is a grand view towards Zeals Farm with Anstey Common towering above it.

A little further on, the vista of the Barle valley opens before you.

The track descends into old woodland, and now both the Barle on your left and the Danesbrook on your right are within hearing. The two rivers meet at Castle Bridge.

After crossing the bridge, the broad path stays with the river, past New Invention House, until Marsh Bridge.

We could have continued to Dulverton as we had done previously, by following the riverside path which begins at Kennel Farm. For the sake of change, we crossed the Dulverton-Winsford Hill road and took the bridle way up through the woods. A stiff climb takes you up to the top of Looseall Wood where we turned right. A good path between banks then takes you into Dulverton where you emerge by the side of the church.

We turned left up the hill to find the Rock House Inn. The “Rock’s” position on the fringe of Dulverton makes it a very different pub to the “Bridge” or “Woods”. Where the “Bridge” looks towards visitors, and “Woods” is Exmoor chic, the “Rock” is the town pub, with a darts board, a pool table, and looped background music. It’s none the worse for any of that, even the music as they had the 60’s CD in the machine. It has the best selection of real beers in town, expertly kept. This lunchtime there were four on tap; Cotleigh’s Barn Owl, Avocet from the Exeter Brewery, Taunton’s Phoenix, and Sharp’s Doom Bar. My wife immediately plumped for the Barn Owl, an old favourite but, in the interests of research, I started on the Avocet. I never shall prefer the fashionable light golden beers to a traditional bitter, but Avocet was a refreshing and pleasant pint after a walk in the sun. It weighed in at 3.9%, which gave it the call above the Phoenix’s 3.6%. I wasn’t driving, after all. No-one present was much interested in eating, but the Rock has a full menu, and chalked up for lunch you could have an imaginative choice of toasted sandwiches, including roast pork and stuffing, and beef and onion, all at £2.95, or a jalfrezi curry with rice or chips – that’s what I call a choice – at £4.95. The beer wasn’t dear for this part of the world, either. Barn Owl was £2.60 and the Avocet £2.20.

The Rock is the HQ of the annual Bolving Contest. The “bolving” of a red deer stag during the autumn rut is the roaring which he makes to keep other stags away from his girls. The competition, which started in the Rock as a private bet between two locals, involves the competitors in gathering at dusk near Marsh Bridge and bellowing in turn to induce nearby stags to answer them back. The best bolver gets a shield. It’s a kind of Exmoor version of karaoke. We didn’t realise at the time that in the pub that morning were such bolving notables as judge Chinner Kingdom and previous winner Elvis Afanasenko. My thanks to Elvis for recommending the Avocet, and to Chinner for remembering who sang the ghastly “Pushbike Song” which swam to the surface on the loop – Mungo Jerry, God rot them. There was no bolving in the pub that morning, although I did win the easiest £10 in my life – from my wife who bet that “Yellow River” was trilled originally by Credence Clearwater Revival. John Fogerty would have turned in his grave, if he wasn’t still alive and playing. Before you rush to Google, this bit of bubblegum singalong tosh was performed by Christie.
The bus whisked us away from the car park by the river at bang-on 3.30 pm. Let us hope that the service does not fall victim to public expenditure cuts in 2010.

Eight Mile Walk from Allerford to the Royal Oak at Porlock via Selworthy

Allerford is a picture-postcard village, particularly on a gloriously sunny September morning. Its cottages and pack-horse bridge would grace the lid of the proverbial chocolate box in a way that the villages of the Exmoor interior, like Exford or Withypool, never could. There is always plenty of room in the village car park, opposite the rural life museum.
We walked back through the village and turned left over the pack horse bridge. The lane quickly dwindled into a narrowish track, bordered by ivy and briar covered banks, but the footing is solid, and this would make a good walk in any season. Above us to the north was thick woodland, and to the right there were far-reaching views over Horner woods and Dunkery.

We ignored the track which promised to take us straight to Selworthy Beacon, and pressed on into Selworthy village itself to see its landmark church. Painted white and standing on an eminence, the church can be seen for miles from the south. Not surprisingly, therefore, it is much visited, and the National Trust owns the village and large hunks of the surrounding country. Sir Thomas Acland, once the landowner, built most of the cottages in the 1820’s to form a “model” village, but now that they have stood for almost two centuries, you would have to be some kind of carping Marxist to dismiss them as just a paternalistic fake.

The church’s airy interior is marked by a splendid gallery into which, sadly, the general public are prohibited from ascending. A lengthy Roll of Honour generously includes those parishioners whom God permitted to return, as well as those He didn’t, although a former rector must have spent many hours pondering on the irony that his son fell in the South African War in some dusty dorp on the veldt with the name of Bethlehem.

The track up Selworthy Combe starts just on the western side of the church. It makes a pleasant climb through ancient woodland, with a stream splashing through the floor of the combe, until the path divides. Here we turned right and soon emerged on to open moorland. When you reach the road which crosses North Hill from Minehead, you need to bear left, and not take the metalled lane straight ahead. The track then takes you up to Selworthy Beacon, from which there are grand views to the south.

We followed the Coastal Path onwards towards the sea, meeting more walkers than you would normally expect in a month of bank holiday Sundays. The reason probably is the handy proximity of the car park and view point at the terminus of the “Hill Road” which comes over from Minehead. The sea was soon below us and, beyond, the Welsh coast, crystal clear in the north easterly breeze. As we picked our way down steep and stony Hurlstone Combe, the cliffs beyond Porlock Weir, and then Porlock beach itself, swung into view.

At Hurlstone Point we turned left and the path took us through woodland and over a foot bridge into Bossington village. The road winds round towards Porlock and at a sharp left hand turn we went straight on where it was signed “No Through Road” to pick up the Coastal Path again. Here it is a wide, grassy, lane between high banks covered with brambles. Exmoor can be a desert for dedicated blackberry pickers like ourselves as the altitude, and the carefully tended beech hedges, mean that briar patches are few and far between. The rotten weather of the past two summers hasn’t helped, either. Here, however, at sea level, there was an abundance of ripe fruit which provided rich pickings on our return from Porlock.
It is best to keep to the Coastal Path until you reach the top of Sparkhayes Lane before turning left into Porlock. If you take an earlier turn, you will land up in a maze of social housing projects on the eastern fringe of the village. We walked up Sparkhayes Lane until we reached the main street, and turned left into the Royal Oak.

The Royal Oak has claimed to be “the only pub in Porlock,” something which “The Ship” at least would feel entitled to dispute. The thrust of some lively internet exchanges between Porlock drinkers appears to be that “The Ship”, known as the “Top Ship” to distinguish it from the “Bottom Ship” at nearby Porlock Weir, is more of a hotel, and only fit for people “over sixty five.” With just three years to go before I can “go down the post office” as some pensioners put it, I can see their point.
The “Royal Oak” is undeniably a pub. Locals were sitting at the bar holding a lengthy conference about association football, and at the far end of the extensive room there was the hallowed collection of fruit machines, pool table, and jukebox, the sine qua non of any self-respecting boozer. None were in use. Out the back there is a skittle alley.
Makers of industrial beers and lagers appear to be competing to create post-modernist beer taps of remarkable size. They are so tall that a careless slip on a wet floor might find you impaled on one like a hooked fish. The surprises among the real beers were Adnams Explorer and Courage Best. As a sort of Bristolian, I have a sentimental attachment to Courage beer. I know that it is now brewed in Reading, or even in Yorkshire, wherever that is, but I can still remember the thick malty cloud which hung over Bristol on a Monday morning when they were brewing in what was the old Georges brewery. I had a pint of Courage, and my wife went for fashionable Adnams. I had called it right as the Adnams, although statistically stronger, failed “to punch its weight” as Sheila summed it up in a favoured family phrase. Indeed, the Adnams was a curiously feeble lemon colour, suspiciously like the dreaded lager, and a far cry from the manly bitters which made the name of the Suffolk coast brewery. The Courage was a good, honest pint, the sort of thing no one would be ashamed to be seen drinking, from Portishead to Peasedown.
You can eat as well as drink at the “Royal Oak”. There were three “specials” chalked up, but I expect that the “caff” food is the most popular on the menu. You can even get an all-day breakfast if you like which includes, miracle of miracles, the ultimate constituent of that glory of English cuisine – fried bread. Let’s face it; how many of us would choose to go to the gallows, or face the revolutionary firing squad, after a plate of lemon cucumber tofu salad? The diners that lunchtime, however, didn’t look exactly as if they were carrying a torch for the politically incorrect. They sat round the edge of the room, side by side and in pairs as if in charabanc seats, staring morosely at the disputants at the bar. The grey pound had never looked greyer.
We retraced our steps to Bossington, picking blackberries as we went. Half way down Sparkhayes Lane, we spotted at the gate of a camp site a flag of St George, torn in half by the winds. It seemed a ragged but appropriate emblem of our country of today - half-price England. That afternoon at Lords, our national cricket team, clad in its red and blue jimjams, was being humiliated by Australia yet again.

We were behind schedule when we reached Bossington, and headed back through the village with its remarkable tall chimney stacks down the lane to Allerford.

If we had had more time, we could have turned into the woods again at West Lynch and walked back past St Agnes Fountain.

Ten Mile Walk from Withypool to Tarr Steps and on to the Bridge Inn at Dulverton

This is not a circular walk. To return to the starting point entails catching the 401 bus, which travels between Bampton and Lynmouth twice a day, on Wednesdays and Sundays only, from 29th July to the 27th September.

Discounting the dash from the roadside car park to the summit of Dunkery Beacon, Withypool to Tarr Steps is the Blackpool of Exmoor walks, or at least its Weston-super-Mare. On a sunny Wednesday morning in early August the gridlock was hardly on the M5 scale, but the evidence of past heavy traffic was there for all to see. In the heavy rains of July the path in places had been turned into a sucking morass by the splatter of passing feet. This riverside walk, however, is a lovely one, and is easily accessible, either from Withypool where the car park is free, or from Tarr Steps where it is not. For refreshments, Withypool boasts the “Royal Oak” as well as its famous tea room, and at the other end you can choose between the sophistication of the Tarr Farm Hotel and the ice cream kiosk.
We left Withypool village by taking the road in front of the “Royal Oak” and climbing some hundred yards up the steep hill which leads to Comers Cross. First you see the stile on the left which would take you towards to Exford and then, just a few yards further on, the stile to Tarr Steps is suddenly visible on the right hand side of the road. The path gives a good view back towards the village as well as over Kings Farm, a very smart and comfortable B&B.

The path here in wet weather can be greasy and fairly tricky, but soon enough you drop down to the level of the river Barle and begin to walk along its banks.
This path is now the only easy access to the walk. Sadly the handy stepping stones below South Hill Farm were put out of commission by a fallen tree over a year ago, and the depth of the water would deter all but the most adventurous from trying the ford except, of course, on a horse. The Exmoor National Park authority shows no signs of any intention of clearing the tree away. “Outraged of Withypool” has already written a letter of complaint. Please feel free to do so yourself.
No one would wish to compose mentally letters of complaint to a quasi-government bureaucracy while walking by the side of the Barle. The rushing sound of the river is always with you. After crossing three wide meadows, the path climbs through a wood of old oaks with the water far below you. When you emerge, you are perched high above a big sheep pasture. Look carefully across the river into the bracken below the woods on the opposite bank. We recently spotted a magnificent stag here.

The wired-in cover on your left is part of the furniture of an important shoot. In September you would find it difficult to move without treading on a pheasant.
It is best to keep to the outside of the pasture and enjoy the nearness of the river. At the end of this huge field, the path again enters woodland. The going for the next couple of miles is poor after wet weather. You find yourself dotting from side to side to avoid the dirtiest bits, and it’s not the place for trainers, which some people like to affect on this route. The nearer to Tarr Steps you come, the better the path again. A footbridge allows you to cross the river and walk the last half mile on the other bank if you prefer. If you stick to the left hand side of the river, the woodland suddenly ceases and opens into a wide grassy walk which leads to the Steps themselves.No one seems to know how old the ancient clapper bridge may be; six hundred years, a thousand years, two thousand years? Take your pick. It’s a magical place even so. Tarr Farm Hotel high above the Steps was a humble farmhouse tearoom when we knew it first thirty years ago. Now it is a luxury establishment, much frequented by shooting parties in the autumn and winter, with a finesse of cuisine far beyond our rustic tastes. There are plenty of tables on the terrace overlooking the river where you could enjoy a coffee, a drink, or a meal.

We passed over the footbridge by the ice-cream kiosk and took the bridleway upwards towards Ashway Farm. At first the river is still there below you, but then the path turns away from it and, after you have passed the farm, it becomes a metalled lane. Far below is Three Rivers, where stags hunted up from Marsh Bridge often turn and go over the top towards Molland Moor.

This road winds up and down, quite steeply in places, towards Dulverton. We had hoped to escape from it, down to the river again but, as the map shows, there are no paths leading to it. If you want to walk the Barle between Tarr and Dulverton, you need to be on the other bank. This is only accessible by walking from Tarr to Hawkridge, along the Hawkridge Ridge, and then down to the river again at Castle Bridge where the Barle is joined by the Danesbrook. From there you can follow the path as far as Marsh Bridge. We marched on from Ashway to Ashwick, past Mounsey Farm where the celebrated huntsman, Captain Ronnie Wallace, lived when Master of the Exmoor. He was known to some as “God”, making him, I suppose, a sort of Eric Clapton of foxhunting.
Eventually we passed Draydon Farm and came down to Marsh Bridge, or bridges to be exact.

Here we crossed the imposing iron bridge and climbed the lane up to Kennel Farm where we were able to get off the road at last. Signs on the road had warned us that the riverside path was closed and, sure enough, where paths diverged, there was a barricade. Apparently there had been a landslip. We, however, were determined to be near the river. What’s the point of a second childhood if it can’t be a naughty second childhood? We clambered over the barrier and pressed on regardless. Well, the authority, whichever it might be, had a point. Only a narrow path remained, and even that will soon be in the river if bolshy walkers keep on ignoring the signs. But signs, don’t you get fed up with them? This is one that they cooked up later.

The huge black hand, the gaping shouting mouth - doesn’t it just make any self-respecting child want to climb them?
The path gives a splendid view of Dulverton as you near the town.

The pub stands on the far side of the old stone bridge at the entrance to the main car park. The Bridge has just one cottagey room but there are numbers of tables outside, each with a substantial umbrella to ward off the elements. There were three cask beers on offer; Exmoor Gold and Ale as well as Otter Bitter.

The Bridge is well-known for its food, and it had certainly pulled a big crowd that lunchtime. Although there are the usual staples of homemade soup and filled baguettes and sandwiches, at the usual prices, its menu is just slightly different from the Exmoor mainstream. The Bridge burger would give that pantomime villain of fast food a really good name with its home minced beef and red onion relish. There are homemade pizzas too. Unlike some pubs, it doesn’t rely on most of its customers ordering steak and chips, which is probably reflected in its price of £13.95.
You can drink and eat your lunch and still have plenty of time to catch the bus at 3.30. Or you can go into the Lorna Doone Stores for some milk, bump into an old friend, and be driven back to Withypool in style, as we were.

Ten Mile Walk from Hawkcombe Head to the Ship Inn, Porlock Weir, via Porlock Marsh

This walk has a little of everything – bracken and heather moorland, a beautiful wooded river valley, a salt marsh, and finally a climb from sea level to fourteen hundred feet in fewer than three miles. The going to begin with, however, couldn’t have been easier as the narrow path from Hawkcombe Head, marked by the remains of a broken signpost, dives off between the heather and bracken.
Soon the coast and the sea appear, framed by the edges of the combe, and the path climbs down into ancient oak woodland.

It follows the river, and so there is no chance of missing your way. Even after the recent heavy rain, the fords were easy to cross and, where there was deeper water, we found handy footbridges.

The woods are a haunt of the wild pony herds, especially lower down the valley where there are riverside pastures. The path eventually comes out of the woods and into a lane bordered by pleasant cottages. If one called “The Peep-Out” is a typical Exmoor hideaway, with the river opposite the house falling over a succession of steep steps, another further on is not. Indeed, anyone who has been frustrated by the notorious rigour of the Exmoor National Park planning office may take comfort from this particular edifice. The setting is magical with the river flowing through the garden. The pedigree of the house, however, complete with a black and white mosaic approach, is by Walt Disney out of Ludwig of Bavaria. Ambitious Exmoor property developers will take comfort from its singular architecture.

Further on the charm of Hawkcombe becomes more conventional as the lane follows the river. The climate here seems positively tropical compared with the head of the valley. Flowers are everywhere, and in one cottage garden a waterfall cascaded between luxuriant hydrangeas.

Hawkcombe seamlessly becomes Porlock, and soon the lane tips you out into the Porlock tourists know so well with its winding high street and lethal traffic. We crossed the road and, turning right, soon came to the entry into Sparkhayes Lane which takes you away from the village and out towards the sea.

When we reached the foreshore, we turned left on to the coastal path which took us across Porlock Marsh towards Porlock Weir. On our right loomed the mass of Bossington Hill. In 1942 a Liberator bomber, hopelessly lost in dreadful flying conditions after a U-boat patrol in the Bay of Biscay, clipped the edge of the hill and crashed into the marsh. Only one member of the crew survived. You will find their memorial at the side of the path.

The grassy path also takes you past the remnants of a submarine forest. The shingle bank is deteriorating in places, and a decision has been taken to allow the sea to go where it wilt for the time being. Eventually the path disappears, and the going for the last few hundred yards is over the shingle before some steps take you onto the road just outside Porlock Weir.

Porlock Weir, even on a greyish day, is a nice spot with its backdrop of wooded hills and its tiny harbour. If you cross the lock gates, you come to a rank of thatched cottages called Gibraltar perched on top of the shingle. It must be some experience to sit there by your fireside in a winter storm, listening to the sea crashing on the shore within yards of your home. The “Anchor Hotel” closed in a hurry – the ghostly dining room tables are still covered by their table cloths – but the Ship Inn next door is very much in business. The bar is a long, narrow room with low black beams, although there are a considerable number of tables outside facing the water where most punters choose to sit. There were four cask ales available, together with the usual industrial concoctions and a remarkable series of taps which distributed draught wine by grape variety; cabernet sauvignon, merlot, chardonnay-semillon, and so forth. Living as we do in a complete backwater, this was a magical emanation of vinous progress. What next? Taps, perhaps, which spurted particular vineyards, Chateaux Petrus or Lafitte, perhaps?

Sadly, I didn’t see them in use, and we chose to drink Cotleigh Harrier. Typically, when we are all ready to taste a brew new to us, the barrel gave out as our pints were being poured. We switched to Otter, which is a strongish bitter with good, typical colour. It also came in the brewery’s charming glasses with its standing otter on the side. Meanwhile the lady behind the bar was pumping bravely at the new barrel of Harrier and so, just as we drained the Otter, we were able to move on to our original choice. Harrier is a modern version of the “boy’s bitter” I used to drink as a youth. You would have drowned in it before you were incapable. Even so Harrier is an excellent beer to choose at lunchtime. Despite its low alcohol strength of 3.5% and its lemony colour, it bursts with flavour. The brewery claims that it appeals to the “more modern, health-conscious, drinker.” Well, that recommendation should kill it dead if nothing else does but, despite that ghastly bit of copy-writing, we liked the beer.
The Ship serves plenty of grub at reasonable prices. The menu comes on one of those ugly laminated cards, but I don’t expect that it’s felt necessary to change it too often. The Ship knows what the tourist trade likes and gives it to them. That marker of pub grub prices, the baguette, comes in at around a fiver, and there is a wide selection of popular fillings. You can have them all in sandwiches if you prefer, something of a rarity in some pubs these days, and welcome to those who find eating a baguette as tiring as a visit to a dental hygienist. We also approved of the pub’s offer of all its main courses in small and large portions, suitably priced; something others would do well to imitate.
We eventually accepted the inevitable and set off to climb to Pitcombe Head. We walked up past the Porlock posh noshery, “Andrews On The Weir”, (lunch a reasonable £10 for two courses,) and turned right towards Worthy tollhouse. After only a short way a narrow path started upwards to our left, and we began to climb. It’s a steep haul, and I soon found myself thinking of President Sarkozy of France, a mere sprog compared with a bus card holder like myself, collapsing while jogging a few days previously. I consoled myself by remembering that I wasn’t married to Carla Bruni, either, and eventually the track became wider and the gradient more tolerable as we approached the toll road above Yearnor Mill.
After a few yards on the road, we turned up the no-through road towards Pitt Farm, where a team of builders was refurbishing the old house and buildings. Behind the farm we turned left, and then we followed a broad track up through forestry until we reached the main Porlock-Lynmouth road opposite the old AA box.

It stands redundant, a reminder of a more gracious period of motoring when AA men rode to the rescue on motor cycles with sidecars, dressed in khaki uniforms like despatch riders of the Great War, deferentially saluting drivers like my father who sported the chrome and yellow AA badge on the radiator grille of their Morris Minor shooting brakes. We crossed the road and passed a lovely mare and her foal as we walked from Pitcombe Head along the bridleway back to our truck.