I had been to Porlock Weir before without my family and I really wanted to take them there. I noticed there was a walk nearby in Bossington that takes you up to Hurlstone Point and you can look back over Porlock Marshes and the beach there, so thought this was an ideal activity before heading to the pub after in Porlock Weir for refreshments.
The walk starts and ends by a river which gave our Lab Digby infinite joy, so this walk was a winner from the off. Starting from Horner Water, you make your way through woodland onto the cliff hillside to make your way up to Hurlstone Point. As you ascend you get wonderful views over Porlock, the bay and the marshes.
At the top of Hurlstone Point there is an old coastguard look out and behind it rocky outcrops that my boys loved climbing. It was at this spot that we met a lady, who working for conservation, was there to monitor dolphins. She had not seen any that day but she did say that 'Charlie' the resident seal had come to visit. We could see him with the naked eye, and this lady was photographing this activity. She showed us the photograph that was zoomed in and lo and behold Charlie had a ray in his mouth. Amazing photograph. This lady was so lovely and spent a lot of time talking about her work with my eldest and he was inspired to consider this as a future job. What a wonderful job that would be!
At this point you are on the South West Coastal Path if you were to continue, but we were turning back to where we started in a circular loop. On the way down we forked to the left to take a different path back, this snakes you way around Hurlstone Point through ferns until you reach the woodland again that will take you back to Horner Water.
To make a much longer walk you could walk to Porlock and back but we parked in the Village of Bossington, to then drive to Porlock Weir after.
Porlock Weir is a quaint harbour with a vast stony beach, and when you are sat on it you are looking at Hurlstone Point, and we could see the coastguard tower we were at an hour before.
We headed for a play at the beach, making balancing stone sculptures and paddling in the sea with Digby and eating the most delicious banoffee ice cream, from Harbour Stores.
Before getting a drink we had a mooch around the shops. My favourite was Exmoor Glass, such a beautiful array of hand-blown glass gifts. There was also an art gallery and a crystal shop that we went in as my children love crystals.
We ended our day on this now very sunny afternoon at the wonderful Bottom Ship Inn, on the tables outside over looking the Bristol Channel. Bliss!
The next day we were not so lucky. It was raining all night and all day. Now that we have the Caravan, we actually didn't feel it too keenly and had a wonderful lazy morning, reading and listening to music. However after lunch I decided to take the boys on an activity while my Husband stayed at home with the dog.
After a quick google search I found Stoppers Roller Rink in nearby Barnstaple. My eldest had done roller skating about 6 years ago at Centreparcs but my youngest has never done it so I donned skates to to help out, wondering if I can remember the skills I had back in the 90's from when I owned a much-loved pair of Grafs.
It didn't take long for my eldest to throw himself into it, such is his personality but my youngest is much more risk adverse. However the girls on the rink got him a frame on wheels so he could build up his confidence. I earmarked an hour here but it came and went so quickly and we were all having so much fun. You aren't kicked off you pay for the afternoon, so we ended up staying for 2 hours. We all left trying to find a rink closer to home that we can go to when we were back, even I could see myself wanting to do this regularly.
That night we ate well after unexpectedly burning off a lot of calories and slept soundly in our caravan, hoping that tomorrow will be a better weather day.
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