The Pembrokeshire Coast Path runs between St. Dogmaels in the north and Amroth in the south following as much of the coastline of the county as possible - a total of 186 miles. Inspired by a random thought, and supported by the Trailblazer Publications book by Jim Manthorpe, we decided to walk part of the path and settled on the north-most section between St. Dogmaels and Newport. The book describes this as the best but toughest part of the path with a distance of 16 miles.

We stayed at the Gwesty’r Castell (Castle Hotel) in Newport on the Saturday and Sunday nights and, on Sunday, travelled by road to our start point, then walked back to Newport. The previous day we had driven to St. Dogmaels and found the official start of the path (and a pint at the Ferry Inn) thanks to the book and no thanks to the apparent lack of any marker. We drove to Poppit Sands car park and continued up the country lane to Alt-y-Coed Farm. So these first 4 miles or so we covered by car.

Terrible though it may seem, we started out Sunday by taking a taxi (Home James Taxis) to our planned start point by Alt-y-Coed farm. The only other public transport option would have been a bus to Poppit Sands but this was not available on a Sunday at this time of year. Judging by how knackered we felt at the end of the walk this was a very good move.

We started walking about 9.15 arriving back in Newport at 18.45. A long day but we did stop a few times. The overall distance walked was about 12 miles based on the book and Tony’s GPS - Jeff’s pedometer had it at 16 miles - given the ups and downs on the terrain this may have been nearer the mark depending on how distance walked is measured! The scenery along this part of the path is spectacular - the photographs below give some idea but can hardly do justice to real life. Perhaps we’ll walk other sections of the path and may even try to complete it in bits.