Shalfleet and Hamstead Cliffs

Today my people took a day off work for walking.  We were lucky with the weather as they had booked it a while ago.  We were going to go out for breakfast but the weather forecast said it would be very hot so we decided to have breakfast at home and make an early start.

We started at a village called Shalfleet. We parked near the New Inn pub, unfortunately it wasn't open yet, you can see by the early morning shadows that there was a while to go before opening time.  This pub gets a good baboon rating, great fish and chips and other meals, a great old building and fantastic puddings.  We went there with @hi_im_monkey for his only night on the island and he had fish and chips.

Shalfleet is a small village near Yarmouth and it has an interesting history, it has been quite wealthy in trading days because of the harbour at Newtown Creek nearby.  I'll show you that later.  It has a old church that was mentioned in the Domesday Book.  The big tower was added in the 11th century so the people could hide in there if the French invaded.

We went over lots of fields.

and through some wooded parts.

We did have to cross some roads very carefully.  It is a beautiful walk.  After a number of fields and woods we started to gently climb down the cliff path towards the beach.  On the way I stopped to look at the views.

You can see the south coast of the mainland from here, the town is Lymington where the ferries, that link with Yarmouth on the island, go from.

Looking the other way (eastwards), I could see all the way to Cowes, the famous island sailing town.  You can just make it out behind the trees.

 



Before we actually got to the beach I stopped to pay my respects at this monument.

It is in memory of two young men who were lost at sea, off the Hamstead ledges, in 1932.  Soon after that we got to the beach.

You can see how calm and blue the sea was!!  I could have stayed here, but it's an eight mile walk and we were only about half way through.

We climbed back up and crossed a couple of fields, taking time to check out the hay on the way, it was a good spot for a rest.

 

Behind me is Newtown Creek, you will see it closer up soon and you can just see Cowes sticking out in the distance.

We crossed a couple more fields and reached these wetlands.  They do look a bit dry, but that is because they are tidal, not a drought!  We discovered they were tidal a couple of years ago when we stopped to eat our lunch and gradually our feet got wet!  Heee heee!

While we were crossing here our manperson (Stephen) thought he saw an otter but we don't know for sure and I don't know whether there are otters there, it would be nice if he did though wouldn't it.

We crossed the wetlands, on creaky duckboareds, and got to Newtown Creek.

Its very popular with sailors who walk up the creek to the New Inn.  There is another walk we will do soon where I will show you more of the creek, harbour and the village of Newtown.  We had to walk away from it.  Here we reached the slightly dull bit of the walk, about half an hour on a long straight dirt road.  After that you turn off through a woody bit and cross this wobbly bridge (with your heart in your mouth)!

We made it phew!!  Then we crossed a field with these lovely blue flowers , it was full of flowers and grasses, we liked these blue flowers especially!

We walked down the side of this field and over a style, there are a lot of styles on this walk for our little legs to climb.  Then we had to very carefully walk for a short way along the side of a busy road and then, even more carefully, cross the road.

After that we crossed a couple of fields and then we were back to the fields we started with, we crossed them and walked through the village, back to the car.  We collected our yummy picnic (left over pizza, corn chips and dips from yesterday oh and yes, some salad!).  We ate that alongside Newtown Creek.

It was a lovely walk on a very hot day.  We came home and had tea and buns!!

Thank you for reading!