Holywell Bay to St. Agnes: South West Coast Path Day 19 Guide

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The weather forecast for today hadn’t been great, and waking to the sound of rain on the tent at 5 a.m. suggested it was disappointingly accurate. The light sprinkle eventually became a decidedly less-light downpour that lasted until 8:30 a.m., turning an early start into a much later but also much drier one.

One bonus of the ever-present breeze on the southwest coast is that bad weather often doesn’t last long. Sure enough, by the time we’d packed up the tent and got ready to leave, the clouds had gone, the sun was out, and the only reminder of the day’s damp beginning was the soggy grass underfoot.

Our friends had joined us for a few days on the trail, and decided that one of them would walk with us all day while the other would drive their van to where we thought we might finish and then walk back to meet us in the middle.

With that in mind, Lauren, Dan, and I got dropped back at Holywell Bay for breakfast at the beach bar, which took an age to arrive but was well worth the wait. I mean, any breakfast bap where you have to skewer the hash brown to the top of the bun is more than alright by me.

Lauren’s foot hadn’t really improved overnight, so slow and steady was the order of the morning as we set out through the dunes and followed the attractive stone marker posts back to the coast. The attractiveness didn’t last, unfortunately: rounding Penhale Point, we passed the ugly remains of an old army base that now seemed to serve little purpose beyond being a blot on the landscape.

Still, I didn’t have it in me to complain: with weather that was far sunnier than forecast and gentle rolling hills instead of the usual diet of steep cliffs and valleys, this was already a much better day than I might have hoped for. If I looked in any direction except towards the army camp, at least.

There’s evidence of mining all over the Cornish coast, and this section was no exception: large, deep holes with scary-looking warning signs lay all around, some of them surprisingly close to the path. It’s not somewhere I’d want to be wandering around in thick fog, put it that way.

Penhale Point soon became Ligger Point, where we had an epic view down Perran Beach, a stunning stretch of golden sand backed by grassy dunes that runs for two miles all the way to Perranporth.

I’d read that at low tide, you can walk the full length of the beach rather than having to climb up and down the dunes. Just like the day before at the River Gannet crossing, we’d accidentally timed our arrival perfectly, meaning we could just drop down onto the beach and start walking on the hard-packed sand beside the water.

With only footprints and the occasional dog walker for company, the next hour was an absolute delight. We were in no hurry, taking breaks for a drink and to admire the view wherever we saw a flat rock to sit on, and my camera reel is full of near-identical photos of an empty beach beside gently-lapping waves.

A Cornish flag fluttering in the breeze eventually signalled the end of the sand and our arrival into Perranporth, a busy, bustling little seaside town that seemed to be 98% ice cream shops and sunburned tourists on what was by now a hot, sunny day at the end of the summer holidays.

Lauren’s foot pain had been getting slowly worse throughout the morning, so after a quick lunch at The Cove, she headed off to try and find the world’s most-padded walking shoes from the world’s least-promising selection of shoe stores.

Remarkably, she found something that fit the bill at a tiny shop nearby, a pair of white Sketchers that were entirely the wrong colour for hiking, but were definitely far softer than the walking shoes she’d been wearing for the last three weeks.

We reunited with Claire, who’d dropped the van off in St. Agnes and walked back to meet us: it was nice to have someone to tell us what lay ahead for the next few hours. Nothing to worry about, we were told, and so it turned out to be.

After an ice cream break (did I mention there was no shortage of places to get one?), we started out again, through a carpark and up the appropriately-named Cliff Road to get onto the low cliffs that would be our constant companion for the rest of the afternoon.

After pausing briefly to admire the Droskyn sundial, a large metal spike that’s calibrated to Cornish time (20 minutes different to GMT), we left Perranporth and its crowds behind and returned to the near-solitude of the Coast Path.

My elevation chart suggests that the afternoon’s walking was a bit up and down, but that’s really only in relation to the dead-flat morning that preceded it: other than one decent hill a little before the end, I don’t remember any climbs or descents worth talking about.

Something that very much is worth talking about, though, is just how diverse the scenery was over such a short distance, barely four miles from Perranporth to St. Agnes.

Starting off on a narrow dirt track that snaked its way along the side of bracken-covered hillsides, we turned a corner and suddenly found ourselves on the moon. That’s how this former quarry looked, at least: stark, arid, and dusty, full of rocky outcrops and jagged gashes in the cliffs, the monochrome landscape was hard to reconcile with the vibrant ocean and hills that surrounded it.

Just like this morning, mining shafts were all around us: this time, at least, most of the ones near the trail were fenced off and covered by unusual tepee-shaped metal structures to stop random walkers like us from toppling in.

The roar of small planes climbing into the sky let us know that we were close to the Perranporth Aerodrome: it’s just inland of the trail, although we couldn’t see it from where we were.

Finally leaving most of the quarry spoil and mine shafts behind, we could see our destination laid out below us, but there was still a bit of work left to get there. If I’d learned one thing in the last three weeks of walking, it was to mildly dread any place name that ended in combe, and Crosscombe lay directly ahead.

Combe is an Old English word for valley, and god knows we’d become well-acquainted with them lately. Sure enough, the path soon alliteratively took us in a distinctly downward direction, passing a stone chimney and a small carpark with a rocky, narrow access road that looked like the perfect place to pop a tire. Not for the first time in Cornwall, I was glad I was walking and not driving.

“What goes down must climb back up again just as steeply” had become my unofficial Coast Path motto, and yet again it proved itself to be true as we crossed a small bridge over the river and quietly sweated our way back up the other side.

The view from the top that overlooked the beach at Trevaunance Cove was worth the effort, though, as it so often had been throughout this walk. We’d been vaguely talking about going on a little further today, but Lauren’s foot was still painful despite the new shoes, and the call of a cold pint and an early dinner was getting ever-louder.

The main part of St. Agnes is a few hundred yards back from the ocean, but the trail deposited us much closer to the beach. More importantly, it also deposited us right beside The Driftwood Spars, an old pub that had an appealing beer garden on the other side of the lane.

When I found out that it was serving proper meals as well as the ice cream and beer that everyone else was getting, any lingering plans of continuing on were put firmly to bed. The arrival of my pint, and then my fish and chips shortly after, confirmed the wisdom of that decision.

St. Agnes looked like a lovely spot, yet another addition to my ever-expanding list of places we’d like to return to. There are several campsites nearby: we picked up the campervan from the parking lot down the road and drove to Trevallas Manor Farm, a short distance away back in Crosscombe. What a great decision that turned out to be. More on that below.

The short distance and mostly flatter terrain today meant that we’d had an easy day of walking, and were at the campsite by mid-afternoon despite the late start. That gave us plenty of opportunity to enjoy what was left of the sunshine, eat a bag of crisps instead of having a proper dinner, and generally laze around and chat to our friends.

With rain in the forecast again for tomorrow, and the next few days after that as well, any sun was very welcome. Bidding farewell to it as we admired a striking sunset, and choosing to pretend we couldn’t feel the first spits of rain in the air, we stopped our Google searches for variants of “how to fix heel pain while hiking” and headed to bed.

Surely Lauren’s foot would be better tomorrow, right?

Planning

Started at: Holywell Beach Bar (on-trail)

Finished at: Trevallas Manor Farm Campsite (0.5 miles/0.8km off-trail)

From the moment we arrived, we suspected we’d really like this campsite, and so it turned out to be. Family-run, the friendly and relaxed welcome we received couldn’t have been more different to the sterile corporate environment the day before, and at £14.75 per person, the price was better as well.

We were shown to a sheltered grassy spot beside a large hedge: between that and our friends’ campervan, our tent was well-protected from the stiff breeze. The shower and toilet facilities felt brand-new, the camp store was well stocked with snacks, and it was quiet and peaceful with plenty of space to spread out: our nearest neighbours were at least 20 or 30 yards away.

And did I mention that sunset?

The only downside is that it’s quite a hike to get food or drink if you’re not buying it from the camp store: the nearest pub is the one we ate at in St. Agnes, a half-hour walk away. As a result, unless you’re lucky enough to have access to a vehicle like we did for these few days, I’d suggest bringing food with you or taking your chances with what’s in the camp store.

Transport and Parking

There are regular bus services that will get you between Holywell and St. Agnes, but you’ll need to use two buses to do it. From Holywell, either take the 85 and change to the 87 at the Cubert Crossroads (junction of High Lanes and the A3075), or take the 86 and change to the 87 at Perranporth. Expect it to take about an hour all up.

The 85 and 86 services run Monday through Saturday, while the 87 runs every day. If you’re walking this section on a Sunday or bank holiday and planning to use a bus in one direction, you’ll need to start/finish in Perranporth instead of Holywell Bay.

If you’re planning to leave a car somewhere, there are two carparks in Holywell Bay: the National Trust one is cheaper for long-stay parking than the one beside the beach bar.

Perranporth has several paid carparks: Droskyn carpark is right beside the path on the cliffs as you’re leaving town, and has reasonable all-day rates. Most on-street parking is metered and/or time-restricted during the warmer months.

In St. Agnes, our friends used the Repper’s Combe carpark, a couple of hundred yards from the trail back up the road towards the main part of town. It has reasonable all-day rates, but is quite small and tight, so you might struggle to get a spot during busy periods.

An alternative option is the free carpark at St. Agnes Heads, a couple of miles past the town and right on the Coast Path.

Waymarking and Navigation

The waymarking was good and navigation straightforward on this section, helped by that long stretch of beach walking where we’d have quickly noticed any wrong turn thanks to the fact our feet were starting to get wet.

I got the impression that it wouldn’t have been quite so obvious if we’d been walking that bit at high tide and had to pick our way through the dunes instead, but fortunately that wasn’t an issue we had to deal with.

If you head off-trail in Perranporth in search of sustenance (or, you know, a new pair of shoes), just head for the main Promenade carpark to pick the path up again: the trail runs alongside between the carpark and the river, then along Cliff Road before heading out of town.

I used AllTrails as my main navigation app for the entire South West Coast Path, and it worked well throughout. The Holywell Bay to Perranporth section is here, while Perranporth to St. Agnes is covered here. The app is 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

I had no service with O2 in Holywell, but things improved once we got closer to Perranporth and stayed that way until we dropped down to sea level in St. Agnes: the cliffs on either side do a great job of blocking most cell signal.

As a backup, I’d also paid a few pounds for a data 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 throughout my time on the Coast Path: whenever I needed data service but couldn’t get it on my usual SIM, I’d switch to the eSIM and choose a different network.

Facilities

We enjoyed our breakfast at the Holywell Beach Bar, and not only because it was the only place that was open for food in the morning. There’s also a Nisa Local convenience store inside the Parkdean holiday park if you need supplies.

After that, there are a few food options at the Haven holiday park behind Perran Beach, but personally I wouldn’t be climbing the dunes and veering off-trail to get to them: you’d be much better off waiting a bit longer and choosing one of the many alternatives in Perranporth instead.

Beside the coast at Trevaunance Cove, there’s a taproom and pizza restaurant (Schooners) as well as the pub I mentioned earlier. Up the road in the main part of St. Agnes, there’s a range of other options including pubs and bars, seafood restaurants, takeaway Chinese and fish and chips, and more.

Accommodation

Even though it’s a short section, there are several campsites within reach of the trail. We stayed at Tollgate Farm near Perranporth the night before, although I wouldn’t particularly recommend it, and there’s also a simple (cold-water shower) but charming summer popup site called Cligga Cliff Farm Camping on the edge of town.

As well as Trevallas Manor where we stayed in Crosscombe, there’s also Cross Combe Farm Campsite nearby, Spitfire Park beside the aerodrome, and St Agnes Beacon, a little way south and inland from St. Agnes Head.

If you’d prefer to stay in something with solid walls and mod-cons like, I don’t know, a bed, you’ve got plenty of choices there as well. Of those, this cute little cabin would be my pick in Perranporth, while the pub that we liked in St. Agnes also does accommodation and is right beside the trail.