Prawle Point walk
This walk is full of drama: heart thumping clifftop climbs, with rocky raised beaches below. Look out for the sunken Demetrios below Signalhouse Point and don't miss the ancient boundary stones that dot the landscape. Call in at the Coastwatch visitor centre to find out more about this wild and beautiful landscape.
Total steps: 5
Total steps: 5
Start point
Prawle Point car park, grid ref: SX775354
Step 1
From the car park, join the South West Coast Path and turn right towards Gara Rock. Walk up the hill towards the look-out at Prawle Point, soon passing the row of coastguard houses. The Trust has been working with the local tenant to create flower rich pasture here, which is a key site for rare invertebrates including the Long-horned Bee and Mediterranean Oil Beetle which need nectar rich areas to survive.
Step 2
Continue west along the coast path, through a gate, and onto the clifftop of Prawle Point. This headland, the most southerly in Devon, has served on and off as a coastguard station and Lloyds signal station since the 1860s.
Step 3
Continue along the path as it climbs past cairns (built by walkers) and through the stone walls of ancient fields – these are protected scheduled monuments and are hundreds, if not thousands, of years old. At Signalhouse Point a late 18th-century admiralty semaphore station once stood on the summit, similar to that near Soar. Follow the path as it cuts through the rock and out over Elender Cove, with views to Gammon Head.
Step 4
Keep on the coast path, past a steep detour to Maceley Cove, and go through the gate and onto Gammon Head, taking the path up the incline.
Step 5
Continue along the cliffs to reach Pig's Nose. An unsuccessful iron mine operated here from 1857 to 1860, its cliff-face adit now hidden by gorse. Turn inland at the waymarker, up the path and through a gate. Ignore the next gate and instead turn right and head uphill, with the wall on your left. Pass through a gate into a green lane, and at the next junction of paths go straight ahead to eventually emerge onto the cliffs, alive in summer with orange tip, heath brown and red admiral butterflies, as well as crickets. Ignoring all paths down to the right, keep to the higher path until you reach a lane which leads up to the road. Turn right and back to the car park.
End point
Prawle Point car park, grid ref: SX775354
Trail map
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