Old Harry Rocks

Walk out to the point and there they are: a line of brilliant white pinnacles standing proud of the turquoise sea, gleaming against the water as though newly scrubbed. These are Old Harry Rocks, chalk stacks and a worn stump at Handfast Point, and they mark one of the last great landmarks of your whole journey, the eastern gateway of the Jurassic Coast. After hundreds of miles, the path has brought you here, to the brightest rocks on the coast.

These stacks are pure Cretaceous chalk, the same dazzling white stone that builds the South Downs and the famous Needles far out to your east. And that is no coincidence, for in the deep past this headland and the Needles on the Isle of Wight were joined in a single unbroken ridge of chalk. Over unimaginable spans of time the sea gnawed through it, opening a gap that widened into the water you see now, leaving the two ends of the ridge stranded on opposite shores. Old Harry is what remains at this end, and it is a living lesson in how the sea takes a coast apart, cutting first caves, then arches, and at last isolated stacks that stand alone until they too fall.

Let me help you read the rocks. First, look at the stacks themselves, blinding white in sunlight, their sheer sides streaked and their tops sometimes tufted with green, rising straight from the clear sea. Second, look for the gaps and the low chalk stump nearby, the remains of stacks that have already collapsed, for the shape of this point is always changing. Third, turn and take in the sweep of Ballard Down behind you, chalk grassland alive with rare butterflies and wildflowers in summer, a soft green counterpoint to the white cliffs. Fourth, gaze north across Studland Bay, the wide arc of pale sand and heath and dune leading your eye towards the mouth of Poole Harbour, and, if the air is clear, catch the far glint of the Needles across the water, Old Harry's long-lost twin. And fifth, watch the cliffs and stacks for seabirds wheeling and nesting on the ledges, and the sea below for the shifting bands of colour where chalk shallows meet deeper blue.

These chalk cliffs are unfenced and, by their nature, crumbling, so this is a place to enjoy from a safe distance. Keep well back from the edge, especially in wind, and resist the urge to peer over, for the ground near the lip can be undercut and fragile. From a few steps back the view is every bit as magnificent, and you can give the rocks the long, unhurried look they deserve.

Now for the name, which is a small mystery in itself. Some say Old Harry is a folk-name for the Devil, who is supposed to have slept out on these very rocks; others link the name to Harry Paye, a notorious local pirate who once haunted this coast. There was even, tradition says, an Old Harry's Wife, a companion stack that stood beside him until the sea brought her down long ago, leaving him to keep his watch alone. Devil or pirate, husband or landmark, he has stood here through every version of the story, white and unmoving above the tide.

Pause here, because this is the last great view of the walk. From Old Harry the Coast Path rounds Ballard Down and drops towards Studland, and then there is only the gentle final stretch to South Haven Point, the very end of the six-hundred-and-thirty-mile path. You have walked from Somerset to reach this white headland; you have nearly done it. Take your photograph, breathe in the salt and the chalk-bright light, and let the sight of these dazzling stacks stay with you as you turn for the finish. Walk safe.