Barnstaple to Challacombe

9 May 2010 - Barnstaple to Challacombe

Distance - 14.3 miles

Weather - Rain to start, dry later

We stayed at - Twichen Farm Bed & Breakfast, Challacombe, Barnstaple, Devon, EX31 4TT  Cost - £70.00

It was raining when we left The Royal & Fortesque Hotel - so much for the good weather! We crossed the road and found a small supermarket that was open, despite it being a Sunday, where we bought some water and crisps. The way out of Barnstaple was quite fiddly and nothing special until we reached Pilton, which was a lovely village of stone houses and an attractive church. The sound of pealing bells filled the air and the rain started to ease. We were carrying full packs for this leg of the walk, as it wasn't a long distance footpath with a luggage carrying service and it was too expensive to keep using taxis to ferry our rucksacks about.

We followed a road past Raleigh House and onto a bridleway. The walking was delightful, with countless types of wild flowers in bloom in the hedgerows and lots of birdsong. The path, called Smoky House Lane, which looked like it had been there hundreds of years, ran above the River Yeo and through Raleigh Wood.

Just before Youlston Wood, the public footpath diverted off the track, rising up 180 metres before returning back down to the track again, we decided to be naughty at this stage and simply stayed on the level track. We didn't see anyone and saved around half a mile, as well as a great deal of effort.

The path ended at Chelfham and we glimpsed the restored viaduct before walking up the road to a fork off to Lower Loxhore. The viaduct was restored in 2000, although unfortunately the last train ran over it back in 1935. We turned off onto another footpath, then steadily rose to join the road just before Bratton Fleming. I had thought about using another bridleway here, but it seemed to dip into the valley and lose all the height we had just gained, so we stayed on the road. The road continued to rise and seemed likely to go on forever, but at this point we found the pub at Bratton Fleming and stopped for lunch. Just as well, as after the pub the road continued to rise until we reached Four Cross Way. Here we were rewarded with great views, one of which was our first view of Exmoor.

From Leworthy Cross, we walked to Northland Corner, on top of the hill. We picked our way down carefully, when we were met by the "Beast of Exmoor" or rather a large slavering dog. Following him were a group of people with another more friendly lurcher. We climbed up to the farmhouse at Buscombe and followed a really muddy path, then road, through to Lee Ball. We then used a footpath to chop off a large dogleg and entered Challacombe. The village contained an excellent pub called the Black Venus, where we had tea, once we had climbed up the road and drive to Twichen Farm. Coincidentally, we ran into the same two dogs, Poacher and Perro, that we had met earlier, which belonged to Twichen Farm!

Finally, I must mention that there were a couple at the Black Venus, the bloke of which had the largest torch I have ever seen. Luckily they left before dark, otherwise several ships in the Barnstaple area might have thought there was a new lighthouse! If his torch had existed in the early 1940s he could have used it to track German bombers!