Combe Martin to Woolacombe: South West Coast Path Day 4 Guide

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After brewing my morning coffee on a handily-placed log and a quick stop to say hi to the campsite’s resident alpacas, we were packed away and out the gate by 8 a.m.

After returning to where we’d left off the day before, and just for something different, the day started with a climb as we headed out of Combe Martin. The path largely tracked the busy A399 all the way to Hele Bay, but there were only short sections where we actually had to hear or walk alongside it.

Leaving one of those sections, we turned back towards the coast to pass the fancy-looking Sandy Cove Hotel, where we’d had a tasty and surprisingly good-value lunch a few days earlier.

From there, the path carried on through a patch of woodland, down past Broadsands Beach, and through a lovely-looking campground with scenic views towards Watermouth Cove. Walking a few feet from people eating oatmeal in their pyjamas felt slightly weird, but the chorus of hellos as we passed suggested nobody cared too much.

Watermouth was a pretty little spot: we’d hoped to stop at the cute Storm in a Teacup cafe for breakfast on a boat in the harbour, but it was still half an hour from opening as we passed. Not to worry: unlike the first three days of this walk, there’d be plenty of other options along the way.

After another short section of walking beside the road opposite Watermouth Castle (less of a castle and more of an amusement park, apparently), we again turned towards the coast to loop on a scenic dirt path around a couple of small headlands.

Lauren loves alpacas perhaps even more than I love goats (and that’s a lot of love), so you can imagine her delight when we got to have our second camelid viewing of the day. A small herd at the far end of a paddock spotted us as we spotted them, and promptly trotted down to the fence to take a closer look. We were not sad about this.

The trail had been lovely and quiet away from the busy road, but that soon changed when we rejoined it for a loud but relatively brief walk into Hele Bay. It’s essentially on the outskirts of Ilfracombe, but felt very different to it: more chilled beach vibe than busy tourist town. We liked it a lot.

Dropping down from the main road, we decided on Bay Cafe for breakfast, mostly because it was the first place we came across and there was a friendly dog outside.

An excellent choice it turned out to be, with one of the best pasties I had on the entire Coast Path (vegan curry), good coffee, and views of the beach, ocean, and people in large campervans doing 800-point turns when they realised they couldn’t go any further down the road. Free entertainment for all.

It had been a relatively easy and comparatively flat couple of hours between Combe Martin and Hele Bay, but the steep switchbacks that greeted us at the end of the beach were a taste of what the rest of the day had in store.

“Not far to go!” lied a friendly passer-by as we stopped to catch our breath, the sweat on my t-shirt making it obvious which direction we were headed. Eventually cresting the hill at Forthglade, we were at least rewarded with a stunning view over Ilfracombe.

Lauren had warned me that Ilfracombe had a reputation for being a bit tacky, but it didn’t seem like it as we sped down the other side of the hill and followed the metal footsteps inlaid in the footpath into town.

As it turned out, this is very much a town of two halves. The first bit around the harbour was a delight, with Damien Hirst’s famous Verity statue guarding the entrance and the wheeling seagulls and white-painted buildings a strong reminder of the fishing village that Ilfracombe used to be.

After rounding Capstone Hill, however, I found the literal and figurative other side of town. A travelling circus blasted music and smoke into the air, tourist numbers instantly doubled, and souvenir shops popped up like mushrooms after autumn rain.

Speaking of rain, even the weather seemed determined to dampen my view of Ilfracombe as clouds rolled in and a light drizzle threatened to make me get my jacket out of my bag for the first time on this walk.

Fortunately the stiff breeze that accompanied it blew the rain away as quickly as it had arrived. By the time we’d got to the viewpoint at the top of (wait for it) the steep hill half a mile outside town, the only moisture to be found was from the sweat on my brow.

It was another 2½ miles from there to the turnoff to the little village of Lee, and even though there had been scenic views and a relatively soft trail for the latter part of it, we couldn’t have been more ready for lunch and a proper break.

The delightful old Grampus Inn provided both, and even though it’s a few minutes off the trail down a steep lane that you’ll have to climb back up again afterward, I’d highly recommend the detour.

Sitting in the beer garden with a pint and sandwich, shoes kicked off and sun shining brightly, I could almost forget that it was already 2pm and we’d only just hit the halfway mark. Almost.

As it turned out, the second half of the day was quite a bit tougher than the first. And no, not just because of that lunchtime pint.

This is one of those sections where the elevation chart is a bit misleading. None of the climbs or descents between Lee and Woolacombe were more than 200ft (60m): it’s just that there were a dozen of them in under seven miles (11km).

I really didn’t want to add any extra distance if I didn’t have to. So of course, stomping up the hill from Lee Bay, I completely missed the obscured sign pointing off to the right and carried on for an increasingly-steep quarter of a mile before I thought to check the map on my phone and turn around. Sigh.

My reward for getting back on the right route was two steep valleys one after the other enroute to Bull Point. A family with young kids was visiting the lighthouse there, and asked whether I thought it would be an easy walk from there to Ilfracombe and back.

I suggested that perhaps it would not.

From there, several more ups and downs lay in store along the coast towards Morte Point, although thankfully none of them were as steep as what I’d endured enjoyed earlier in the afternoon.

This was an attractive and enjoyable stretch of rugged coastline, complete with seals playing in the water and basking on the rocks below. I was enjoying myself despite the long day, and only half of me wanted to take the turnoff to North Morte Camping and stay the night there instead of carrying on to Woolacombe as planned.

The wind had picked up a bit and ominous dark clouds loomed on the horizon, but other than a few spits, the rain thankfully stayed further up the coast. Not a lot further up the coast, mind you: rounding Morte Point (so-named because of all the lives lost to shipwrecks there), the dramatic view towards Woolacombe suggested there’d been a bit of precipitation recently.

Still, the sun was doing its best to break through those dark clouds, and had largely succeeded 45 minutes later as the quiet of the trail gave way to Woolacombe’s busy and bustling street. This is a popular tourist town in the summer, as the overflowing pubs and restaurants confirmed.

We found a table at The Jube, which was just as busy as the rest: as a result, it took forever to queue for drinks and wait for our meals. I’m not sure the food was entirely worth the wait, but either way, a bit of enforced rest was not a bad thing by this point.

Woolacombe’s camping options were mostly distinguished by not actually being in Woolacombe, a fact that I’d only vaguely noted when planning out the day. It was thrown into much sharper focus when I realised the one we’d picked was not only half an hour’s walk away, it was also up an extremely steep hill. Because of course it was.

Slogging our way up Challacombe Hill to Little Roadway Farm Camping took every remaining scrap of energy, and even the dramatic sunset views weren’t enough to distract from the promise of a hot shower and several hours without shoes.

Just for something different, it had been a long, tough day.

Planning

Started at: Newberry Valley Touring and Camping Park (0.2 miles/0.3km off-trail).

Finished at: Little Roadway Farm Camping Park (1.1 miles/1.8km off-trail up a steep hill)

The biggest issue with Little Roadway Farm is its location: lovely as the view is from up on the hill, the mile-plus off-trail climb to get there is a big ask at the end of a long day. Tip: be sure to take the public footpath that runs parallel to Challacombe Hill Road, rather than the road itself. The latter is narrow, with speeding cars and no footpath, and isn’t particularly safe to walk on.

While the roadway may be little, the campsite itself isn’t: there are three different fields, catering for a mix of campervans, caravans, and tents. We were in Buddleia field, which had three glamping pods plus a bunch of unassigned space for tents. Most usefully, it was close to the shower block, camp shop, and small common room.

The shower blocks weren’t particularly busy at 8pm when we were using them, and the cubicles were clean enough. The common room was super-useful, with comfy chairs, power sockets, and a bunch of books that you could read if you had more time and energy than we did.

We also made good use of the camp shop the next morning: they weren’t doing breakfast that day despite the sign out front suggesting otherwise, but coffees and pasties were a lot better than nothing.

Given where we were and the size of the campground, it’s probably no surprise that it was popular with families, and there was no shortage of kids running around until after dark. They didn’t keep me awake for long, though: they’d have had to try very hard to achieve that given how far we’d walked that day.

We paid £15 per person for a flat and grassy pitch. It wasn’t particularly sheltered, but since there was very little wind that night, it wasn’t an issue.

Transport and Parking

Getting between Combe Martin and Woolacombe by public transport isn’t difficult, but will require changing at Ilfracombe.

Your most reliable option between Combe Martin and Ilfracombe is the 301 bus, which runs roughly once an hour, Monday to Saturday. From mid-May to mid-September it has a limited Sunday and bank holiday service as well, while from late July to the end of August, the Exmoor Explorer has a limited service (three times a day) between the two towns.

Between Ilfracombe and Woolacombe, it’s the 31 bus that you need. Again, it runs about once an hour from 7am until early evening.

If you’re driving, paid carparks and some free on-street parking are available in both Combe Martin and Woolacombe.

If you don’t want to walk the entire distance in one go, you’re probably best to break the journey at Ilfracombe. The 35 bus runs occasionally between Lee and Ilfracombe (three times a day, but only on Tuesdays and Fridays) but other than that, you’re looking at taxis or car shuffles until you get to Woolacombe.

Waymarking and Navigation

I managed to completely miss a sign buried in the undergrowth after Lee Bay, but in general the waymarking was reasonable on this section of trail other than in Ilfracombe.

After some promising metal footprints at the start of town, signs and markers petered out after leaving the harbour area. My suggestion is to stay as close to the coast as you can, going around the seaward side of Capstone Hill and along Granville Road before turning off at Torrs Walk Ave to pick up the signposts again.

I used AllTrails as my main navigation app for the entire South West Coast Path: it was an ideal backup for the signs and official guide book, and I used it a lot on this day in particular. You can find the Combe Martin to Woolacombe route here: it’s free to use, although I pay a couple of pounds a month for a subscription so I can download maps to my phone in advance.

Phone Service

As with much of the Coast Path, cell service was good in the towns and pretty spotty elsewhere, at least on the O2 network. I had very little signal when we stopped for lunch in Lee, and none for most of the afternoon unless I was up on top of a hill (and even then, not always).

Fortunately I’d paid a few pounds for an eSIM from Instabridge that let me swap between all three UK networks, EE, O2, and Vodafone/Three. It worked really well as a fallback option: whenever I needed service but couldn’t get it on my usual SIM, I’d switch to the eSIM and choose one of the other networks. If there was any signal to be had in the area at all, I’d pick it up.

Facilities

Combe Martin, Ilfracombe, and Woolacombe have all of the food, drink, and accommodation options you could ask for, although do note that if you’re starting out early like we were, there may not be anywhere open for breakfast.

Along the way, other than the cafes and pubs I mention above in Watermouth, Hele Bay, and Lee, there are also places to eat and drink in Lee Bay.

Accommodation

There are several campsites within a short walk of the trail before you get to Woolacombe: Watermouth Valley Camping Park in Watermouth, Hele Valley Holiday Park in Hele Bay, and North Morte Camping near Mortehoe.

If you do stay near Mortehoe, there’s a pub there (the Chichester Arms) that does evening meals. That makes this a good option for a shorter day: it cuts the distance by about five miles, and the campsite is much closer to the trail than any of the sites in Woolacombe.

There are endless hotel, B&B, and (especially) holiday cottage and apartment options in Woolacombe that provide a lot more comfort and let you avoid that half-hour slog up the hill to the campsite. Likewise, Ilfracombe has literally hundreds of accommodation choices if you don’t want to camp. Between the two, the Smugglers Rest in Mortehoe also has accommodation.