You know when you have one of those moments where you think “if it’s sunny in morning I’m off out for a mooch”? Well, on Saturday night, that’s exactly what I thought. After reaching my boredom threshold of flat, local walks I decided to have a go at a walk I saw recently in a little video documentary on Facebook – Andrew White’s Walks in East Yorkshire.
…. Apart from I intentionally started in a different place and accidentally didn’t wander through the village centre, oh, and also did it the opposite way round so the sun would be behind me …
But, apart from that…
So, Sunday dawned, bright and sunny and off I pootled up to Flamborough. I parked up at Thornwick Bay (darn it, the clifftop café there doesn’t open until Easter
) and got the last parking spot in the severely restricted “ample parking” area.
Anyway, off I meandered across the field to meet up with the road back into the village. I figured if I headed in the general direction of the “south” of the headland I couldn’t go far wrong but didn’t really pay much attention and managed to somehow go down every residential street that wasn’t the village centre. Eventually I popped out onto a road which had the word “south” in it so that sounded good and I meandered to the nearest fingerpost that pointed towards the sea and bimbled across a field … and there it was! … The sea, fancy that!
Feeling like a big kid I just stood there and stared at it, all twinkling in the sunshine. It was a good sight to see. By this point I’d already done 2 miles of aimless meandering so I figured I’d better take a left turn to join the Headland Way – the trail I’d be following for the rest of my walk. But before I got too far I decided to take my first pic of the day. Looking back towards Bridlington:
Not long before reaching South Landing I spotted my first bit of truly white cliff (the cliffs sort of morph from boulder clay to chalk along this stretch of coastline) but, wouldn’t you know, a signpost got in the way
:
After a steep, stepped descent into South Landing I decided on a detour to find the little café and public loos. Wouldn’t you just guess, it was up the hill. So up I plodded to the lovely little Seaside Café for a cuppa and was treated to a view of the yellow-copter flying very low and very fast inland. Gosh, it’s noisy! Seeing as I had a cuppa in my hand and my rucksack was at the bench, I didn’t get a pic of it
.
Comfort break finished I headed back down the hill again, only to have to turn left and go up a load of steps again:
Honestly, only stopped to take a picture of the Daffodils… no really, I did. As I popped out at the top I noticed a lovely level trail coming in from my left … which came from the café. So I did all that down and up for nowt
I took a quick right turn and was greeted by this fab lighthouse and bench:
Oh deepest of joys, another sea cut to head down and then straight back up again. Definitely no inland detours this time, despite the map indicating the path went round the cut:
Another couple of these and my legs “knew” they’d done a bit of ascent. But fear not, it wasn’t long before I was meandering along, in the sunshine (and icy wind which, thanks to my windshirt (cheers Peter) I couldn’t feel, though I could have done with my gloves … which I’d left in the car) along the gently undulating cliff top of South Cliff and Cross Bow Hill.
Mandatory signpost pic:
A lovely little cove nibbling into the coastline – I think it was High Stacks:
And then, all of a sudden, I was at Flamborough Head. The lighthouse:
And the fog signal station (that’ll mebby be the thing that makes the foghorn noise then):
I followed my nose as the smell of bacon butties wafted in my direction and found myself at the Headlands Café. It would have been wrong not to. To be honest, I needed to thaw my hands out cos they were nithered so I wrapped them round a cuppa and scoffed a bacon sarnie in preference to my squashed sausage roll and near-frozen bottle of water before setting off again and spotting this just outside:
Just a little further on is Selwicks Bay. The coastline starts to get interesting now with sea stacks and caves and holes. Looking back towards the headland across Selwicks Bay:
You also start to get a lot of sea birds nesting in the cliffs. This cliff is absolutely rammed with birds – they grey lines you can see on the cliff are actually rows upon rows of birds:
Don’t believe me? Here’s a close-up:
And an info board:
Just before reaching North Landing, there is this fab sea stack, again, the area is teaming with birds:
But look – what’s that on the top?:
That’s right. A car tyre. Of course. Every sea stack should have one. The des-res of nesting spots. How on earth did it get there? A bizarre game of nautical hoop-la perhaps?
Just a little further on, and I think this is my favourite pic of the day:
And so to North Landing:
By now, I guessed I’d only have about an hour of daylight left and, with a couple of miles still left to go (and increasingly gawk-worthy views to look at), I err-ed on the side of caution and followed the road a short way back to the lane where my car was parked.
It’s times like these when I’m glad I leave a flask of hot water in my car. And a couple of biscuits. And a proper mug. And some teabags. And milk. And a spoon. I nearly didn’t, on the assumption that the café would be open, but then I remembered the holiday resorts close for Winter.
A much needed meander along the wonderful East Yorkshire coastline. I’ve got unfinished business with the last bit and beyond.
I’ll be back.
Thanks for reading