Post by Dave on Sept 13, 2010 18:04:57 GMT
Higher Brownstone to Froward Point 26th April 2010
I had planned a real surprise day out for Carol today that would have required an early start, but I knew last night it would have to be put on hold until Wednesday. We got back home from Kingsbridge yesterday and when Carol got inside the house she went into a very scary shivering sort of fit conplaining she was freezing cold. Four hours later in bed and she was sweating like I have never seen her do before, it was so bad I spent all night having to keep swiming back to my pillow.
By lunch time today she said she was feeling so much better and really wanted to go out for a walk and checking the internet I found what looked like a really magic walk and it was only three miles long and not that far away from our home in Paignton.
Well you all know our walks always seen to go wrong somehow and near the end we were unsure if we could go down this private driveway into Home Farm, we choose not to and must have put a further two miles onto the walk, it took three and and a half hours in the end.
To get to the start of the wallk simply head for Hillhead at Brixham and take the road to the lower ferry( left fork) and then make sure you turn off left on the road to Coleton Fishacre, just as you get to the entrance gate of Coleton Fishacre turn right and look for the Brownstone car part on your left. Park up and go throught the gate at the end of the car park and just start walking and keep walking.
During this walk you really are treated to some amazing views and you get to see the Daymark, a great 1942 war world two Battery and you can also pop into the National Coastwatch lookout and have a chat with some really lovely people.
The Daymark is 80 foot/24m high and was built in 1864 by the Dartmouth Harbour Commissioners as a guide to mariners to the position of the harbour entrance
The complex at Brownstone Battery was built in 1942 as a defence against German naval attack. The site was equipped with two six-inch guns taken from a First World War battleship. Each gun had a range of over 14 miles, and operated in tandem with a powerful searchlight situated close to the high water mark below. During the War, the Battery was manned by up to 300 soldiers, and the cliffs all around were strung with barbed wire.
The National Coastwatch look out room has a web cam situated on the roof, they gave me a card with the site address on it but I could not see the link for the web cam, anyway take a look at their website as there are many interesting things to read on it
www.nci-frowardpoint.org.uk
After you have looked around the Battery and chatted to those lovely people in the lookout room, you go down a narrow path that in parts is in woodlands, you then pass above Newfoundland Cove and some time later you end up going down a very large number of steps down to Mill Bay Cove. There is a house on the left hand side of the cove that must be worth millions and I said to Carol I would love to live there and she said it’s too isolated and too far from the shops.
They say what does up must come down and I knew there just had to be steps to go back up somewhere and we soon found them and boy I was I so glad when I got to the last one. You then turn right along a very quite private lane and after a while there is a split in the road, It does say on the sign on the right lane that its for access to Home farm only, as it turns out the foot path goes behind the farm and back up to the car park at Higher Brownstone.
Only we could not agree if that really was the right way to go and I lead us both off on the right lane that really added those extra miles that by now really were not that welcome to a man who sits behind the wheel of a van all day for a living.
