Walking the Pembrokeshire Coast Path – Porthsele to Porthgain

Day two of our weekend walk. We’d moved one of the cars from Solva to Porthgain the previous evening, so all we had to do on Sunday was get up and walk, but as usual it took a little while to get going. The stiffness in our legs quickly wore off. Not quite such a perfect day for walking or photography, with high cloud and some humidity, but still lovely to be out.

It was busy around Whitesands and out to St David’s Head, but once onto the northern side of the head there were few other people. This is a strange stretch which never looks the same twice, where we have lost our bearings in the mist and once lost an hour (finding it again 2 days later). Continuing north-east, we could see as far as Strumble Head, with the rocky summit of Penberi close to the coast, and we knew that we had one of the steepest climbs ahead of us. Lunch had to wait until we got to the top (never a good idea to stop and eat at the bottom of a hill) but I was more than ready for it by the time we got there.

We gradually dropped back down, with many twists and turns, reaching the road just before Abereiddy. Another packed car park and we paused for refreshments before following the coast path up the other side. To my astonishment, the signposted path doesn’t go round the top of the Blue Lagoon (a spectacular sea-flooded quarry) so if you didn’t know it was there when walking the path, you would miss it by just a few metres.

I was starting to flag but the last couple of miles were easy walking and we pushed on, though this is an area which deserves much slower exploration – the beach at Traeth Llyfn, abandoned quarries, paths along old tramways, a rocky cove. At last we reached the top of Porthgain, then just 50 steep steps down to the quay. Usually we’d round off this walk with a pint and burger at the Sloop, but it’s not open yet, so after a quick diversion back to the caravan to collect belongings and other car, we went home for a very welcome bath and meal. 10.9 miles.

And finally thank you to Ian for many of the photos for the last two walks – now he has his new camera he can download them much more easily, so I now have two sets to choose from. It doesn’t make it easier!