Durdle Door to Ringstead on the Jurassic Coast
Despite living in Dorset for over 25 years, I’ve never walked the section of the Jurassic Coast path from Durdle Door to Ringstead Bay. This may be due to the challenging ‘roller-coaster’ nature of the cliff-path, however, this is a walk not to be missed. Although not strictly speaking on the Isle of Purbeck, this route needs to be on your ‘bucket list’.
It really doesn’t get much more spectacular that the geological formations at Lulworth and Durdle Door. As a 16 year old O Level geography student from my school in south Cambridgeshire, I joined the thousands of others over the years, to visit the Isle of Purbeck on a field trip. Despite living inland, the allure of the sea persuaded me to live near the coast as a ‘grown up’. That field-trip exposed me to unique coastal features such as Stair Hole and Durdle Door, plus the awe-inspiring sheer chalk cliffs that line the coast here.
This walk begins near the village of Lulworth, where you can either pay to park near the visitor centre, or park for free on the roadside, close to the church. I recommend doing this walk off-season as Lulworth Cove and Durdle Door have become very popular as sight-seeing attractions in the summer months and bank holidays. Going off-season, even when the weather is not wall to wall sunshine, allows you to enjoy the beautiful scenery without the summer hordes (hopefully readers of this blog will spread out their visits to avoid hypocrisy on my part!).
From the church, walk towards the village, then look out for a path on the right, on the other side of the road, opposite the first row of houses. The path crosses over a field, then through a gate and up some steps onto the steep side of Hambury Tout. As you walk onto the top of the hill and pause to catch your breath, keep turning round to take in the view, back across the coastline of the Isle of Purbeck behind you.
The path soon joins with the main track up from the car park in the village and, turning right, you’ll continue beyond St Oswald’s Bay and the Man o’ War rock, until you reach the world famous sea arch, Durdle Door. Follow the coast path all the way to Holworth House, enjoying notable landmarks along the way. The wildlife can also provide some highlights; the day we completed this walk a young kestrel modelled for us on a nearby fencepost, seemingly waiting for us to get close enough to take a photo, before flying down the valley swooshing his wings.
Keep walking west along the path, ensuring that as you pause for breath (which you will undoubtedly have to do as there are some steep climbs) you admire the view behind you, as well as in front. You’ll eventually reach White Nothe, an aptly named headland as it looks like a big nose protruding into the sea. There is a route down to the beach at White Nothe, down the notorious ‘Smuggler’s Path’, a zig-zag route also mentioned in the children’s book Moonfleet by J.Meade Falkner. Our guest walker, Ben Rochelle, gives this book a mention in his My Isle of Purbeck blog, as he imagines the characters chasing up the twisting path ahead of him.
In his blog Ben also refers to the perhaps equally aptly named locations of Scratch Arse and Scratchy Bottom, the latter being situated on this route! To assure you it is a steep, rocky ‘cliff valley’ and well sign-posted to avoid walkers and climbers succumbing to an uncertain fate of sliding down a scratchy bottom!
Back to White Nothe… There is an interesting row of cottages located here, seemingly impossible to get to by car and impressively 'cut-off’ from the rest of the world. I suspect they are holiday homes now, for those who prefer a temporary suspension from life as most of us know it, rather than a permanent one. Previously these cottages would have been used by coastguards, who had a great vantage point along the coast east and west. You’ll also notice an old World War Two ‘pill-box’, another relic from yesteryear.
Standing at the edge of the cliff at White Nothe you can see for miles to east and west, back along the route you have just walked and onward to Weymouth and the Isle of Portland in the distance - like the Isle of Purbeck, not actually an island as a road connects the mainland along the edge of Chesil beach (inspiration for the novel by Ian McEwan).
Not far from White Nothe you reach Holworth House, where you turn left and then right again through a gate that leads you back along the top path all the way to the caravan site at Durdle Door. You might notice that on the gate-post it says ‘church’, which is a reference to a small wooden chapel on the way to Ringstead Bay - I shall save this for another day.
8.8 miles
3 hours 45 mins
1785 ft
Fields and Paths
Yes - woof!
OS Grid Ref: SY 822 806
Latitude: 50° 37' 32" N
Longitude: 2° 15' 6" W
Elevation: 108ft
