My wonderful girlfriend and I decided to go for a walk on the Isle of Wight. As with most of our lengthy walks, we had decided on where we were going to start, had a rough idea of a few places to visit, but didn’t have a clue where we would end up. We journeyed through beautiful countryside from Ryde to the seaside town of Ventnor. However you can also easily journey via bus to Ventnor from other towns, such as Newport.
We had planned to walk to Ventnor Botanic Gardens, then find a bird reserve later and take it from there. We didn’t realise one part of coastal walk was closed off for temporary work, another part appeared to have vanished into the sea, and yet a third path was is being repaired and won’t be open for a while, which just meant we found ourselves on lesser known paths and alternate routes at times.
We found the gardens and sat in one for a while recouping from the stroll, and planned to come back to explore later in the day, but wanted to head onto the bird reserve I had spotted on our six year old map….. I mention the map being six years as frankly the small reserve either doesn’t exist any more, else we strolled right by it. We realised we were not going to find it and in the end we decided not to turn back, but venture on!
As with many coastal walks, you often find yourself walking on the edge of a cliff. We were rewarded with breathtaking views, benches to rest at with nobody else in sight and plenty of sea air.
There were a few coves with sandy beaches along the walk, and we only saw one being used. Though we didn’t feel like a private beach and carried on strolling.
We were following temporary signs at one stage, but still managed to get lost somehow, which made for an interesting mile or so of walking (there is a story, but I’m not sharing!).
We managed to reconnect with the path and were rewarding with stunning views.
Instead of turning back to visit the gardens properly, we decided to go hunting for St Catherine’s lighthouse at Niton which we had been meaning to visit. We were rewarded with a beautiful view of the lighthouse and a bench to enjoy the remainder of our lunch.
We most likely wouldn’t have been able to walk back before dark, and instead grabbed the last bus (they finish early at Niton) to Newport.
It was a fantastic stroll, but we were glad we wore our rain jackets, carried plenty of water, food, map and a bus time table.
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