Day 171 – West Wittering Beach to Prinsted: 13.8m: 5.2h

For the third trip running, we have breakfast issues. On this occasion, the Travelodge does provide breakfast which John has booked for each room….without realising that it’s a “takeaway breakfast” which is a bag containing cereal, milk (complete with disposable bowl and spoon), pain au chocolat, flapjack and carton of orange juice. Following what may have been unnecessarily protracted discussions last night, John, Mike and Gary leave the Travelodge at 7 o’clock for a more substantial brekker (bacon and sausage sarnies and cups of coffee) at the local Greggs on East Street, with Mike and Gary having first collected those elements of the Travelodge offering which are easily consumable on the hoof. Helen and Ben stay in their rooms for another half an hour, complete with takeaway bags, and the team reconvenes outside the Travelodge at 7:45 to meet a cab which John has ordered. The cab leaves without going along North Street, so we don’t complete the full set of the four directional thoroughfares in Chichester. We get back to West Wittering and set off from the end of the beach car park at 8:15. It’s another warm and bright day starting with 3 miles north along the east side of the Chichester Channel, one of several channels running off Chichester Harbour. It’s a gorgeous start to the day with the path running partly on the shoreline and partly through wooded areas as far as West Itchenor. Here we take a short ferry ride across the Chichester Channel to continue alongside the Bosham Channel to the very attractive Bosham Quay. Once around the quay, we have to take a short inland diversion to get past a boatyard before returning to the water’s edge and reaching the northern end of the channel at the A259 road. We’ve now covered almost 8 miles and Helen turns right to go to Bosham station, hoping that the dwindling battery in her key fob will still grant her access to the car, and with several very clear and helpful pieces of advice on what to do if it doesn’t! The rest of us turn left to start the remaining 5 miles or so to Prinsted where Helen plans to meet us. It’s only a short walk along the main road before we’re able to turn off and go south to complete our circuit of the Bosham Channel. It’s also only a short period of time which elapses before we hear from Helen that, thankfully, she’s managed to get into the car. We reach the end of the channel at Cobnor Point, but then have a 180 degree turn to start our circuit of the next inlet, the Thorney Channel. This borders a marshland nature reserve where another short inland diversion is required along a low grass embankment. We reach the northern end of this channel to the south of Nutbourne and we then have about a mile to reach a car park by the Prinsted scout hut where Helen is waiting for us. Mike, Ben and Gary are traveling home from Southbourne station which is only a 15 minute walk away, but are dropped off at a more convenient location from which to get there (the Traveller’s Joy pub) by Helen and John as they start their journey back to Gloucestershire. There have been a few train cancellations today, but they don’t cause too much inconvenience. After a leisurely beer, we catch a train to Chichester where there’s enough time to buy sandwiches before a service to Victoria arrives. As has become customary, Ben and Gary alight at Clapham and Mike is able to get across London from Victoria to catch a slightly earlier train than his planned (and now cancelled) service from St Pancras to Nottingham. Overall, a result.

Day 170 – Church Norton to West Wittering Beach: 15.7m: 5.7h

John again travels to Sussex by car with Helen. As happened last time, they park at a station which is on a line to our day 1 meeting point and which is also on the route of our day 2 walk. On this trip, the station is at Bosham where they have a bit of a chat with the station master (is that still the correct job title?) who clearly enjoys looking after both his station and his customers. A seven minute train journey gets them to Chichester where they have time to secure a cab before Mike, Ben and Gary arrive from Victoria/Clapham a few minutes later. In fashion news, Ben is sporting a support bandage around one of his knees which doesn’t prove to be a major hindrance. We’re back in the church yard at Church Norton shortly after 11 o’clock and, in bright and warm conditions, set off again along the west side of Pagham Harbour to Selsey and around Selsey Bill itself. The coastal path sticks pretty close to the shoreline – which is very welcome given that most of the beach continues to be shingle. We continue north west towards East Wittering but, after a couple of miles, have to move inland to get round a series of creeks and area of marshland. This takes 90 minutes or so. The path away from the coast can best be described as meandering, but the route back is far more direct and we regain the coast just to the east of Bracklesham beach at around 3 o’clock. The tide is out and so, having crossed a narrow strip of shingle, we’re able to spend the next hour walking next to the sea along hard sand, past East Wittering and on towards the beach car park outside West Wittering. There’s a short spit of land beyond the car park which it is unanimously agreed that we can – and therefore should – walk around, although Helen leaves us at this point to walk into West Wittering with a view to finding a pub where the rest of us can meet her and from where we can call for a cab to take us to our overnight stop, the Travelodge in Chichester. Unfortunately, all Helen’s efforts prove to be wasted. The only pub she can find is closed so she makes her way back to the car park entrance to meet the spit circumnavigation quartet who have, in the meantime, ordered a cab to pick us up from there. We only have to wait a few minutes for its arrival and we get to the Travelodge by 5:30. Before checking in, we walk the short distance to the end of the road to have a drink at the Dolphin & Anchor, a Wetherspoon establishment on West Street serving its customary range of competitively priced beers. It’s also very busy, and some of the clientele (or potential clientele) standing outside attract the attention of the local constabulary for reasons ostensibly concerned with illegal substances and possibly, in the case of one young lady, exhibitionism! Investigations are still in progress when we return to the Travelodge to check in, but appear to have concluded an hour later when we leave again to have supper at a Côte brasserie about a 5 minute walk away on South Street. Starters, mains and 4 bottles of wine later, we ease our way back to the Travelodge with John, Helen and Mike unable to resist the temptation of a return visit to the Dolphin & Anchor for stickies.

Day 169 – Littlehampton to Church Norton: 16.8m: 6.1h

As was the case on our last trip, the Arun View does not provide an early breakfast and so, having already paid our bills, we leave at 7:15 with the aim of finding sustenance en route – hopefully within the first couple of hours. Immediately outside the pub, we cross the Harbour Bridge, a retractable steel pedestrian footbridge linking east and west Littlehampton. Going along the west bank of the river, we pass Littlehampton Golf Club which is remarkably busy for so early in the morning. We get back to the coast where a rather bouncy boardwalk is available before we’re able to cross a narrow stretch of shingle to reach sand on the sea shore which affords comfortable underfoot conditions for the next 30 minutes or so. We then have to cross back over the shingle near Atherington to a coast track which, after a short while, has a signpost indicating, encouragingly, a café. However, such café as might have existed cannot now be found. We carry on to Elmer and then to Middleton-on-Sea where we’ve been informed by a couple of passers-by that there might be somewhere open for breakfast. It transpires that to investigate this will require a diversion inland of around half a mile – and so, although it is now after 9 o’clock, we continue westwards. Our patience is rewarded when, at 9:30, we get to Felpham and see the Boat House Café with an inviting menu on the door. Initially it seems that even this might be a disappointment because we’re told by the women behind the counter that the chef hasn’t arrived yet. However, when we say that we just need bacon, eggs and toast (plus teas and coffees) they reckon that they’ll be able to rustle this up. And rustle it up they do. Indeed, they seem inordinately pleased with the charming Mr Harkness’s parting comment “Who needs a chef”? Shortly after leaving the Boat House, we reach Bognor Regis. Here, Helen leaves us to catch a train back to Barnham where she will pick up the car and drive to collect us from today’s finishing point at the north east corner of Selsey Bill. Our route there is relatively straightforward, but involves going around Pagham Harbour. This isn’t a boating harbour, but a large sheltered inlet serving as a nature reserve and wetland site for wildlife. There is a walking trail around the area but, before embarking on this, a small disagreement arises as to whether we need to include in the walk a narrow spit of land which stretches about half a mile into the harbour. Is it, as the maps apparently suggest, a spit which can be walked around and therefore to be treated as a mini Spurn Point, or simply, as one person’s eyes suggest, a single out and back path and therefore to be treated like a jetty or pier, in the same way as Horrid Hill in the Medway last year? The majority view is the former. In accordance with our country’s great democratic tradition, the decision to include the spit is greeted by the minority with all the grace which he believes it merits, and the subsequent discovery that the spit is in fact an out and back path is greeted by the majority with all the regret which they believe it merits! The walking trail takes just over an hour to complete. For the most part, this is along well maintained tracks but, towards the end, we have to cross a couple of very wet and muddy fields. The effect on our boots is such that we probably wouldn’t have been welcome at the very smart Crab and Lobster pub/restaurant near Sidlesham Quay had we been minded to call in for refreshment. But we have no thought of so doing because we are still nearly half an hour away from the church at Church Norton where Helen is meeting us and she is already in a car park just outside the village. We arrive at the church just after 2 o’clock a couple of minutes before Helen and, following a change of footwear, drive to Chichester where John and Helen drop Mike, Ben and Gary at the station and then continue their return journey to Gloucestershire. The Foundry pub is conveniently located for the rail travellers to while away their time before catching trains home although, as we approach the bar, Mike is asked to remove his cap. For the first time any of us can remember, we are in a pub which doesn’t like its customers to wear headgear! Still, the beer’s ok, our trains are on time, and we have less than 140 miles to go until we’re back at Poole Harbour. So maybe just the 9 days left….??

Day 168 – Shoreham-by-Sea to Littlehampton: 15.8m: 5.5h

Helen joins these two days of the walk, but her and John’s rail travel plans are scuppered by the continued closure (currently scheduled until June) of the Nuneham Viaduct bridge between Oxford and Didcot. Instead, they have decided to drive to Sussex and to park their car at Barnham station. Perhaps not the most obvious location, but a very sound choice. Not only does it afford a short rail link to Shoreham for the start of today’s walk, but it can also be easily accessed by train from Bognor which will be convenient for our return journeys tomorrow. Anyway, notwithstanding their revised travel arrangements, John and Helen arrive in Shoreham about half an hour before Mike, Ben and Gary. This gives them the opportunity to pre-fuel at a café before the whole team assembles and makes the short walk back to the north bank of the River Adur from where we set off at 11:10. Having crossed the ferry bridge, we can see the coast only a few hundred yards further south. However purity of course dictates that, to reach this point, we have to walk eastwards along the south bank of the river to reach Shoreham Fort at the end of a narrow peninsula and then turn back west along the sea front. And so, at the end of the first hour, we’ve walked almost 3 miles to reach Shoreham beach which is less than half a mile from our starting point. The remaining miles are largely unremarkable and incident free. Just a pleasant, straightforward twelve miles in warm weather with a gentle following breeze alongside Lancing beach, through Worthing and Goring-by-Sea, and on towards Littlehampton. The only question which arises is whether to follow the official coast path when it occasionally moves inland onto lanes and paths which are parallel to, but not far from, the sea front, or whether to walk along the beach. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t be an issue. Beach action would be enthusiastically embraced. However, on this stretch of the coast, most of the shoreline beaches are shingle for which there is distinctly less enthusiasm. Accordingly, when a choice is required, a decision to follow the coast path is pretty unanimous….until we reach East Preston, just beyond Goring and some 3 to 4 miles away from Littlehampton. We have just concluded that we are sufficiently close to our destination that, should we happen upon a hostelry, a refreshing pit stop wouldn’t unduly affect the rest of our walk. We’re going along a lane through East Preston and it looks as though the coast path will turn back to the sea front in a few hundred yards, but John and Ben take an earlier turn in the hope that they won’t find any problems if/when they get to the beach. Mike, Helen and Gary continue along the official path and almost immediately are rewarded with the welcoming sight of the Tudor Tavern. Gary and Helen go to order some drinks and sit at an outside table, while Mike goes to inform John and Ben of the pit stop discovery. However, by the time he sees them, they’ve reached the beach, have crossed the shingle to some sand by the sea and, despite the prospect of a pint of cider, aren’t minded to struggle back over the shingle. And so, when Mike gets back to the Tudor Tavern, he finds Gary and Helen at a table with not only a gin and tonic and two pints of London Pride, but also two unnecessary pints of cider. These are returned untouched to the bar when the threesome leaves 15 minutes later. It takes another hour or so to reach Littlehampton. Our overnight stop is the Arun View Inn on the east side of the River Arun and, just over half way along the riverside path, Mike, Helen and Gary find John and Ben sitting outside a bar called the Empress with two bottles of cider. These have almost been finished, so it isn’t long before we continue the short distance to the Arun View where we arrive just before 5 o’clock. A very welcoming bar (with Harvey’s) greets us, so we have a couple of drinks and then check in to the four rooms available at the Arun View. We’re back downstairs for supper in the pub’s extensive dining room overlooking the river, and a very popular place it seems to be. A few nibbles to start with, followed by pies/burgers/fish ‘n chips, all go down very well as do the accompanying bottles, and with no fervent Liverpool supporter in our midst, there’s no pressure to find a TV showing their game at Elland Road. Instead, our evening comes to an end with relaxing double stickies – whilst fervent Liverpool supporters are no doubt equally relaxed watching a 6-1 victory against Leeds.