20/9/2020 - The Isle of Portland Circular (13.26mls)

Fiona dropped us off at the Chesil Beach Car Park part way down the causeway from Ferry Bridge on a bright but very windy day. Being a Sunday there was much wind surfing and sailing activity in the bay which was used for the sailing activities at the 2012 Olympics. It was at this point that we noticed the sad sight of 7 cruise ships moored idle in the bay as a result of Covid-19 - pretty much every day we were in sight of these and later in the week saw 5 more in the bay at Swanage.

The first part of the walk was fairly tedious, initially along the bed of the old railway line on the left hand side of the main road and then at the first roundabout on the right hand side where the path enters a mixed commercial and residential area before climbing up at the back of what was the local school steeply up towards the Heights Hotel. It is well worth the climb up to the hotel where there is a viewpoint overlooking Weymouth Bay ...

and a number of Portland stone objects such as the 2012 Olympic Rings ...

... and a war memorial from both world wars, as ever highlighting the devastation caused to different generations of the same families. In that area there was also our first sighting of a whim crane used to haul large blocks of stone including loading into boats for transportation far and wide and a statue "Spirit of Portland" celebrating the mining and fishing heritage of the area. It was noted how crisp the edges of the Portland Stone objects are even after many years of exposure to the elements and therefore how sought after is the stone which was used to build Buckingham Palace, the Cenataph and St Pauls Cathedral.

Returning to the SWCP there is a small diversion which took us through the Tout Quarry Sculpture Park where we found The Roy Dog, the subject of an old Portland tale ...

By now we were on the sheltered west coast of the Isle of Portland and felt that now we really were walking the SW Coast Path, well away from civilisation but never far away from the signs of the extensive quarrying over many years. Along the way there is a stone arch which DavidL thought worthy of a photo but at this point it appeared that the camera on his iPhone was not working as all he could see both forward and back was a black screen. After much muttering he realised that the phone cover was folded back over the lens!! - the modern equivalent of using a conventional camera with the lens cover on.

Eventually we reached Portland Bill which rather like Lands End is rather scruffy, not helped by the ugly flats at Weston which presumably housed the employees at the MOD buildings in the area. It was also near here that DavidA spotted the first kestrel of week! HaHa. On the way here is also the first Portland lighthouse built at the beginning of the 18th century and converted into a private house in 1906 and owned by Marie Stopes for 35 years ...

At Portland Bill the Davids ate their 'snap' waiting for Fiona to arrive, having spent the morning at Billy Winter's cafe on the beach back at Ferry Bridge. After a chat and a brief stroll round the east end of Portland Bill to see the second decommissioned lighthouse as well as the current in use lighthouse we left Fiona and continued our walk to Church Ope Cove.

Along the way we had seen many whims but shortly reached one where through a trick of the viewing angle the rock nearby seemed to be in the perfect shape of a horse ...

The way forward now passed the imposing Rufus castle, originally built in the 11th century and then rebuilt and strengthened around 1258 and again in 1450 ...

From the look of the route map the directions seemed to get less precise and as a result, whilst chatting away, we met a confused couple, who we had seen previously whilst DavidL was having a moment with his camera by the stone arch. They told us that they had reached a dead end on the current path and were looking for a way up to the prison on top of the cliff. We therefore retraced our steps and soon found where we should have turned to climb steeply up to Castletown and a large chimney - the stone way marker was buried in the vegetation which was partly why we missed it!

By now we were running a bit late but threaded our way past the Young Offenders Institute and then on to Verne Prison which is a very eerie place seemingly built into the hillside ...

Finally we found Fiona in the Aldi car park on the industrial estate and as the evening was beautifully sunny with a now calm breeze we retraced our steps back to a bar on the marina to sit and chat about Team SWCPs day. A very successful first day walking 13.26miles at an average speed of 2.7mph.