TIM BAKER

Before Swanning Around Swanage, A Corfe Whim

So I arrived in Swanage on the bus with trepidation, as I knew it was the last Bank Holiday of the summer, a busy time; and further more there was a steam festival at Corfe Castle which of course many people stayed at Swanage and took the train up to the festival. I was planning to go to a remote campsite called California Farm, but it was the top of a hill. A really steep hill – I was thoroughly exhausted with my bigger mattress slowing me down. I walked what is called the Priest’s Way, an ancient holy trackway through….council estates and a holiday park (?).

I noticed that the Holiday Park – the Swanage Coastal Park – did camping according to Google…this is wrong, they stopped this year and are only a mobile home park now. The women on reception were really lovely though and phoned around Swanage to find that yet, everywhere was booked for the weekend…so California Farm it was. This place has mixed reviews, including that the toilet block is from a horror film (can confirm although had worse as a kid) and I really saw it as a last option….so I trudged on up the hill.

Although cloudy it was really hot, and of course deja-vu, the farm trackway was like the one at Eweleaze: small, heavily potholed and the occasional car. So I leaned heavily on my umbrella as a makeshift trekking pole and stumbled up the hill.

When I got to the campsite….nothing.

I mean one lonely and seemingly abandoned tent (I never saw anyone near that tent all weekend), and a caravan or two in the other field that seemed to be resident (or the occupants were out), and the aforementioned toilet block in the woods looking all Evil Dead. On a Bank Holiday Friday? So I pitched my tent and assumed that I’d bump into the owner at some point (this proved to be kind of right and very wrong, as I found later) as I was hot, knackered and didn’t want to walk to the farm which was quite a way off. There was always a chance they’d not be in anyway, out working on the farm.

Oh and don’t let the view fool you, turn 180 degrees and it’s next to a working quarry. Yes you read right, a quarry. I knew this, and was glad they only worked the Friday but I was dreading morning noise on Saturday. which thankfully never happened. So having a field to myself, I left the tent and then walked back along the road into Swanage. I’d found the Spar and a few shops when I arrived – I got off at the station which was a bit dumb as you have to walk back – Herston Cross is where I should have gotten off. But more of that area later.

So I wandered into town and the seafront – it was shabbier and less posh than I remembered (yes it was never than posh to start with, but when I stayed here 10 or so years ago it felt very sea-sidey but actually quite nice).

I got some chips which were frankly the worst chips I had ever had in the last 2-3 years, let alone the trip from a place called The Fish Plaice. I thought seaside chips were supposed to be the best? I was fed up with fish so had some chicken nuggets – which was my fault, that sort of thing is ususally rank. But the chips were no better. I mean chips in London are better than that!

My feet were killing me, really unhappy, so unlike the start of the trip where I walked the whole of the bay to get to Weymouth, even though I could see Old Harry’s Rocks a few miles off I wasn’t going to visit them. Sad. but that’s for another trip, maybe from the other direction. I walked a little way down the seafront and espied a bandstand and drew that with one of the fine nibbed fountain pens, I forget which – probably a Preppy. I got really cold sitting there, there was quite a lot of wind, and I felt quite ill after….so I looked for a cafe that was open, it was 5-5:30pm ish to warm up.

I should have guessed by now, that the Rules of Dorset is that food is only served at certain times, the idea of All Day Food or evening cafes has not reached here yet. So all the cafes I tried were closed or closing…I eventually found a pub on the way back to the tent that had space on booked tables that hadn’t started yet.

This worried me cos I had no place that night for food and didn’t fancy takeaway after the Worst Chips Ever….all the pubs I tried were booked up, or could serve me then but no later. Like Lulworth the place was booked up! (I’d have booked if I known I had a place to stay, but I didn’t know I had a place to stay til earlier and anyway, I like to be flexible).

I looked in the Spar and noticed they had single use BBQ’s, did coffee and even better gluten-free brioche rolls (finding GF bread in this trip had been mostly impossible bar big supermarkets). I’d avoided getting the stuff for fires previously as even though many places allowed them, the big bags of wood and fire lighters was too much to carry. But I saw they did sausages and other meat, so it was a fall back.

I walked up to Herston Cross, where The Globe pub is and a Co-Op – which although it also did coffee it annoyingly didn’t have single-use BBQs but had the other stuff. The Globe didn’t do food on Fridays but did do food on Saturdays, they had just started that so I booked a table. I then walked all the way back to the Spar, got the BBQ stuff, matches, bread and sausages and headed back to the tent. I was planning a cook out! My first in fact.

I found a rock to place the single use BBQ on and got some water – the site had buckets for everyone to use, handily just in case. I lit it and of course the wind changed, blowing the smoke into the tent. Well at least I didn’t get any insects coming in! I cooked my sausages – my headtorch was useful here since there was zero lighting on the site. They were delicious in the rolls and I wolfed them down with some crisps and watched the fire feeling a bit better. I watched the stars – as with the campsite in Corfe, you could see the stars, even through the streetlight gloaming of Swanage.

Like the other parts of the trip this was a test to see if I could do certain things, and I’ll definitely do this again. A long time ago – I mean a decade at least before they got reall expensive – I bought the original Biolite stove which I almost sold when I had to move, but kept. I almost brought it on this trip, and I didn’t due to weight. Next time, definitely taking it – for warmth, coffee and food!

After my meal I found going to the scary toilet block a sign I missed from the owner banning single use BBQ’s because they were dangerous to wild life…oops. It was that or starve or risk some of the dodgy takeways – although there was a nice looking Chinese at the bottom of the hill with many people waiting. I’d have gone there if I’d known. But hey, money.

But the irony of the campsite owner banning single use BBQ’s for the enviroment – the 10 point list talked about recycling and being good for the planet – with a fucking quarry next door! If you care about the planet, maybe stop the quarrying – I’m sure more than a few insects and animals get crushed by those machines? Those machines kick up dangerous stone dust and definitely do not run on electric and the noise isn’t good for humans or animals. But that’s good for the local ecomomy you see, the whole area is build by quarries – literally so as I found later.

That was the theme for the holiday, there was a lot of po-faced rhetoric about recycling when the major things like motorism and industrial destruction was ignored because money. Fiddling while the planet burns, it gets my goat.

So next day – my last full day in Swanage I’d decided – I headed out for coffee – usually that would be a short trip, but this was two miles! I had heard from the woman at the Holiday Park that Durlston Castle served coffee, so I decided to take a trip there along the coast rather than walk into town on the road. It was a beautiful day, with sailing boats and glittering seas.

This is Durlston Country Park, there are two paths – the easy one to the lighthouse across the top – and the SW Coastal Path at the bottom down a really steep hill that looks like rabbit would take one look at and say ‘no chance mate’. Guess which one I chose?

Yes the lower path! After an ‘adventure’ through some brambles and thistles thinking the desire path by the fence was the right one (it was a few metres lower, doh) I then walked past the Anvil Point lighthouse, up a scrabbly stone path and some caves – more of those later and onward to Durlston Castle. There was a wild runner here, running really fast along the scary rocky path. I would have been impressed but I actualy caught up with him wallking slowly later, and he scowled at me. More haste less speed?

I got to Durlston past the poetic sign I remember from last time when I stopped walking this route late one night saying ‘I’ll be back’ – that was over a decade prior with this intriguing poem, one I’ve only just now found is an uncredited quote by Tennyson:

An angry coast and angry waves,
You seem to hear them rise and fall,
And roar rock thwarted in their bellowing caves,
Beneath the windy wall.

Alfred Lord Tennyson – The Palace of Art

The person who built the rather euphemistically and romantically named Durlston Castle must’ve liked poetry – a guy called George Burt who ran the Mowlem company and built his empire from stone. It’s like a gothic masonry version of the Cement Garden. Quotes and architectural quotations everywhere, a polymath’s Portland stone paradise. But not totally benign, he had plans to develop the estate at Durlston as a massive residential area, which the ‘Castle’ – originally a restaurant for those visiting the estate as a tourist attraction was part of. But it was never finished.

The Great Globe – one of the biggest in the world and the Virgil quotes – even the nod to Castillian architecture on the ‘Castle’ is a fascinating folly in stone which I drew in my sketchbook. It’s not exactly friendly though, rather tough and hard, like the area. But the modern cafe is friendly and wonderful – I had breakfast there, highly recommended and yes with gluten free options. And with an attached art gallery with seascapes which I didn’t view…I didn’t want to focus on anyone else’s views of the area lest I get influenced or downhearted.

Funnily enough there also was a solution to the Victorian Extreme Graffiti Artists – I’ve seen their work on many sites from Abu Simbel and the Pyramid and Sphinx Cheops to ancient sites, houses and follies – is to provide a stone where they could chisel their name!

Teach me the various labours of the moon,
And whence proceed the eclipses of the sun;
Why flowing tides prevail upon the main,
And in what dark recess they shrink again;
What shakes the solid earth; what cause delays
The summer nights, and shortens winter days.

Virgil – Georgics, Book 2, translated by John Dryden

After breakfast I walked back along the coast intending to get to Kingston or Kimmeridge. I passed the Tilly Whim Caves, opened in 1887 by George Burt as a tourist attraction, and closed after a collapse in 1976 – a former Purbeck limestone quarry for the estate – and drew a picture drawing the fact to the Victorian stone sign I had passed. There is a big wall and a Keep Out sign – didn’t stop a man with a child on his shoulders going right up to it, and I hear rumours of people going in there at night. Dangerous.

I then walked on, heading for Dancing Ledge, which I thought I’d found when I found a style in the fence and a ledge, but it was all by myself. A really lovely spot, where I did a few drawings and a watercolour. I had a sort of lunch here of popcorn, sitting looking out on the blue sea. No-one disturbed me all the time I was here.

The title comes from one of the songs I had been listening to – and it’s always on my iPod, Beach Boys ‘Til I Die’ which has some pretty deep lyrics, and the crab pot reminded me of a cork.

I then walked on to the actual Dancing Ledge – and it’s scrambly path down. Again, a previous quarry and like all this coast I saw climbers using the walls for practice. What I wasn’t expecting is that you have to climb up and down the ledges and not obvious what path is best. With my big pack didn’t feel comfortable going all the way down – I did one level which took me back to my free-climbing youth, but I could take my pack off and lift it up – the lower ledges were higher.

Still I saw whole families with young kids going down there, I guess for the natural pool but I did wonder how safe it was when the tide came in. The natural pool was built by the quarrymen for the local kids of Langton Maltravers to swim safely. Goodness knows how they got up and down the rocks though?

After all this climbing I was thirsty, but I didn’t see anywhere to refill my water…I’d not brought enough for a long walk, and I didn’t know if heading inland was better there up the steep hill to the car park or head on. I chose to head on…until I got to the unadvisedly named Seacombe Bottom (LOL) and decided I needed to go inland because I only had a little water left. I was so thirsty! I headed for Worth Maltravers hoping there was a shop or something….and saw there was a pub.

The Square and Compass (aah (Free?)Masons, just realised) was a brilliant pub and I downed two drinks in quick succession – not all alcoholic. I rested for a bit and decided to head back to Swanage on the bus for my dinner date at The Globe in Herston, walking up to the bus stop at Acton. I made it with plenty of time so went looking for coffee as I had brought my flask and wanted coffee for the journey home.

Sadly the promised nice coffee machine at the Co-Op in Swanage was broken, so I panicky scamper to a local garage with a Costa coffee machine which was pretty naff.

And back at the Globe I found they were doing Rib Eye with Chips. Result! I could even charge my battery.

A wonderful meal in a lovely pub, so I stopped and made the last work of the trip there, an abstract collage of all the things I’d seen that day or were around me in the pub. You’ll recognise various bits – the sign above, the stone globe, the things on the table, Durlston Castle. the caves. the compass, and less obviously there was a stag do at the pub of a local lad, and of course they had handcuffed pairs of them together – including the groom and best man in dresses.

And then a guy drinking at the pub mentioned he had cable ties…so they became ‘The Rings’. Evil man, I was chuckling over that while doing this. I then took the road up to the long track up to the campsite, very dark – but I had a torch.

So that was the end of my trip, but not the end of my travails, as when I was having some breakfast in the tent the next day – I’d toasted some of my gluten free bread on the BBQ but it got a bit burnt and was a bit soggy now but needs must – then the owner of the campsite arrived. She proceeded to tell me off for not letting her know who I was or coming over – even though I has been around in the mornings and evenings.

She had been asking the other campers about me, but tellingly for the site, they didn’t say a thing to me. It was that kind of site where people don’t say hello (I did try, people were unfriendly).

She was fairly friendly but I really didn’t appreciate a lecture first thing especially on a day when I had a long trip ahead, I expected a note on my tent or someone to say if she was looking for me if she was that bothered?

I explained that I expected to bump into her, and if I hadn’t I was going to send her some money by Paypal for the time spent – her address is on one of the comments on the Google entry – but she went off saying ‘I could have been dead in there’ and it was my turn to be incredulous when she said some people book out the entire field. She seemed to think I was going to do the tent version of dine and dash. As someone who is hyper-honest, I resented that expectation. She was incredulous that I would have sent her the money. I would.

I gave her my phone number then sent her some money via Paypal for the nights. It wasn’t exactly the cheapest at £8.50 for basically a no-facilities site in the middle of nowhere – only water, and a basic unclean toilet block with no hot water or showers. Especially when you contrast it with what I got at Eweleaze Farm, it’s not a good deal. I have to say generally I didn’t get a good view of Swanage, I wished I’d stayed at Corfe and used the frequent buses.

So now the long walk down the hill to Swanage and the bus stop, and was amused by the promo bumf on the bust (for those who don’t know, Studland Beach is a nudist beach….) and then onto Wareham station. Amazingly I had zero aggro getting back after all that drama at Poole and Winchester, got a direct train and changed at Woking.

Have to say I had a weird feeling going back – partly relief since I was rather tired, partly sadly because I felt I was cutting it a bit short but relieved to leave Swanage and partly dread for that DWP meeting.

I had wanted to walk to Kimmeridge and connect to Arish Mell where I stopped. The problem walking in that area is lack of campsites and it’s very rugged in places – I guess I could wildcamp if needed, although finding water is a problem unless you want to risk drinking from cattle troughs or carry it with you.I will finish it, maybe in Jaunt 2, on the way down further the coast, starting earlier and taking more water.

And the DWP meeting? Turned out to be not as bad as I thought, not sure why they insisted on a sanction-threatened face to face meeting what was actually red tape/admin! All that stress and coming back early for that? Grr.

Things I Learned from the Trip

Firstly I have to pack lighter and get lighter gear – the weight of the tent and that big mattress nearly killed me. Then I need clips and little bags, lots of them, to store food from marauding black beetles and stag beetles – yes found both in my tent! And take wired headphones – less drain on batteries, and go airplane mode wherever I go. Take the faster charger and charge wherever I can. And a change of clothes, a few times I missed opportunities to wash mine cos I didn’t have spares. That will be less of an issue in Autumn/Winter, but yes. Take lightweight spares.

Having a support really does help on cliffs – like the umbrella I used as a pole, so trekking poles will be more than useful. Avoid roads where I can, use paths even if it’s out of the way – the roads are mostly unwalkable and very stressful 50 cars/vans/lorries a minute ones. But do use umbrellas and poles offensively for the ones who refuse not to give space – it seems they worry more about their paint than your life!

And I have to take cooking equipment or food to avoid spending so much on food and pub grub – it soon mounts up – at very least restrict myself to supermarket and takeaway food and only have the odd treat. I’m not really at ‘catch my food, kill it and eat it’ level yet, and probably will never be (and ewww blood!) but I do need to be more self-sufficient on these trips.

Lighter will mean I can take my tent with me, and then camp as I go. That’s the idea, but whether we will totally get there by Jaunt 2 is partly restricted by money, experience and gear. I might do a hybrid of the two – a night along the coast if the weather isn’t bad, stopping at dusk, then continuing on the next day for a proper site and water refill and showers. I certainly do need to wean myself off the comforts slowly. Even with the full pack I could do 2-3 miles fine, depending on terrain. That will increase.

Secondly that Dorset is far from green in ecological terms and has a rather good yet random bus service – some places aren’t served at all – which can be dyspeptic or not turn up. Can’t rely on the trains either 100% – and we have recycling bins everywhere next to quarries, motorism next to backpackers, bamboo books next to single use plastic pens, walking next to works machinery, it’s a place of contrasts. Nature and the machine. And will struggle if the oil runs out (petrol shortage *cough*). Sooner than you think.

Artistically – yes it was a success, some great work, 52 sketches in the A4 and etchr sketchbooks, 8 full watercolours – I’d like to have seen more separate watercolours but it’s a trade off of what you take along, although I didn’t end up reusing pages, which was a fallback and indeed Swanage had a specialist art store AND a WH Smiths. So not totally bereft of art materials – but that’s a trade off between going more off-grid and needing stuff.

As regards whether I found it was possible – hell yes. I think I occasionally need my creature comforts – the legs do prefer a hot shower, it really helps the muscles. But tbh if it’s California Farm level of expensive not much, I may as well be somewhere nicer and free along the coast and take my chances? Tourist places like Swanage are not worth being near and have a real premium – one that hasn’t reduced with more people staying in the UK, it seems to have gone up.

As Which magzine recently pointed out, it’s still cheaper to go abroad that holiday here – something that might be a thing for me as borders unlock? Although again, travelling on planes nukes any green benefit entirely. Maybe ferry/train then, although cost is an issue as well – trains like Eurostar being eye-wateringly (and needlessly) expensive.

And the idea is to go off grid with this series, to places that people cannot go easily but ethically and greenly as possible…i.e. not just turn up with a gigantic guzzlevan with chemical toilet and blasting radio and do my thing. I always envied nature photographers but only the ones who actually embedded themselves in nature, lived in tents, shooting guerilla fashion while in the place. Whereas far too many turn up in a car, take a photo or two at the crack of dawn then leave. Totally missing the point and never getting the true nature and guts of a place.

So, onwards to Jaunt 2!

I didn’t expect this to end up such a massive tome; as I wrote I remembered things and the photos jogged my memory. Here are the other 6 (!) parts, it’s all a bit Lord of The Rings for my liking…

• Part 1 – White Horses, Parachutes, Amazing Pebbles & Kites
• Part 2 – Man O War Went Thru The Durdle Door And Got A Dungy Head
• Part 3 – What’s a Sheep Lulworth with All MOD Cons?
• Part 4 – Mupe Bay & Great Fossils of Rock
• Part 5 – Corfe Castle & St Edward The Martyr
• Part 6 – Corfe Castle – Escape from the Model Village
• Part 7 – Swanage Around The Globe On A Tilly Whim