South West Coast Path Itineraries: 3 Days, One Week, Two Weeks

The South West Coast Path is 630 miles (1,014 km) long and the official day-stage list runs to 52 days. Walked end to end with a few rest days that is seven to eight weeks, and hardly anyone has seven weeks. So the useful planning question is not "how long does the whole thing take" but "which piece fits the time I have, and can I get to both ends of it without a car".

This guide answers that with the same distance and ascent figures as the stage pages, which are measured along the mapped route. Every option below is a run of consecutive official stages, so the day-by-day detail — climb, surface, water points, ferries — is one click away.

How to read the numbers

Ascent is what decides a day on this path, not distance. The route drops to sea level at every cove and river mouth and climbs straight back out, so a 16 km stage with 630 m of climbing (Sidmouth to Seaton) is a harder day than a 24 km stage with 235 m (Woolacombe to Braunton). The hours column is the estimate on each stage page and assumes a steady walking pace with short stops; add your own lunch and photo time.

Stage 49, the Isle of Portland circuit, is an optional loop that starts and finishes at Ferrybridge. Include it or not — the Dorset options below show both.

Three-day tasters

Three days is enough to find out whether you like cliff walking. Pick by how hard you want it.

Port Isaac to Newquay is the one to recommend to someone who has never done a multi-day walk. Every day is graded moderate, the highest point is 85 m, and the middle day carries only 340 m of climb. You cross the Camel estuary on the year-round Padstow–Rock ferry and finish at Newquay, which has a station on the Atlantic Coast Line. Port Isaac has no railway, so arrive by bus — local buses run along most of this coast.

Minehead to Combe Martin is the opposite proposition: the climb over the Great Hangman on day three is the biggest single day of ascent on the whole route. Minehead's station is the terminus of the heritage West Somerset Railway rather than a National Rail station, so most people arrive by bus from the main line at Taunton.

Ferrybridge to South Haven Point gives you the last three days of the path and the finish marker. Stage 51 crosses the Lulworth firing ranges, which are open most weekends and through the summer stand-down but closed on many weekdays — the best-time guide explains the pattern. Weymouth is on the main line from London Waterloo; at the end, the year-round Sandbanks chain ferry and the Bournemouth–Swanage bus that uses it get you back to a station.

One-week sections

Padstow to St Ives (stages 15 to 20) is the classic first week. Six days, none graded hard, two of them — Portreath to Hayle and Hayle to St Ives — among the easiest on the path. The scenery is Bedruthan Steps, Watergate Bay, the Gannel, Perran Sands, St Agnes Head and the Wheal Coates engine houses, then Godrevy lighthouse and the long sweep of St Ives Bay. St Ives has its own branch line. Padstow does not, so start with a bus from the main line.

Marazion to Falmouth (stages 25 to 29) rounds the Lizard, the southernmost point of the mainland, in five days with a station at each end: Penzance on the Cornish Main Line is a short walk or bus ride from Marazion, and Falmouth is on the Maritime Line. Two crossings matter — Gillan Creek on stage 28 is stepping stones at low water or an on-demand seasonal ferry, and the Helford River ferry on stage 29 is seasonal, with a long detour via Gweek when it is not running. Walk this one between spring and autumn.

Minehead to Westward Ho! (stages 1 to 7) is the full Exmoor and North Devon opening in seven days, with the highest climbing on the route in the first four and the flattest in the last three — Braunton to Instow has just 30 m of ascent. Barnstaple, the end of the Tarka Line from Exeter, is the railhead for the estuary days. The Instow–Appledore ferry on stage 7 is seasonal; the alternative is the inland walk via Bideford bridge.

Seaton to South Haven Point is the Dorset week — the whole Jurassic Coast section from the Undercliff through Lyme Regis, Golden Cap, Chesil Beach and Lulworth to the finish. Leave out the Portland circuit and it is six days; include it and it is seven. Weymouth's station falls in the middle, which makes it easy to split into two long weekends.

Two-week sections

Ten walking days plus rest days and travel fills a fortnight comfortably. None of these needs a car.

Minehead to Bude is the hardest fortnight on the path: three of the ten stages are graded hard, and Hartland Quay to Bude (856 m over 25 km) is the day most walkers name as the toughest of the whole route. Bude has no railway — its station closed in 1966 — so the exit is by bus.

Bude to St Ives is the whole of north Cornwall: Boscastle, Tintagel, Port Isaac, the Camel, the surf beaches and the mining coast. Only one stage is graded hard (Tintagel to Port Isaac, short but steep), and Newquay's station sits halfway if you need to split it.

St Ives to Falmouth is Penwith and the Lizard: the roughest ground in Cornwall on day one (St Ives to Pendeen), then Land's End, Porthcurno, Mousehole, St Michael's Mount and the Lizard. Stations at St Ives, Penzance and Falmouth make it the easiest fortnight to reach and to break.

Plymouth to Exmouth is the estuary coast of South Devon, with seven crossings in eight days, including the low-tide wade of the River Erme on stage 37. Plymouth is on the main line; the Riviera Line serves Torquay, Paignton, Teignmouth and Dawlish; and Exmouth is the end of the Avocet Line from Exeter. Walk it between spring and autumn — the Yealm, Avon and Exe ferries are seasonal.

Chaining the counties into the full walk

If you intend to complete the path over several years, the five county sections are the natural units. Each has its own page with every stage, its climb and its grade.

Cornwall alone is 25 stages — half the walk — and most people split it at Newquay, St Ives, Penzance, Falmouth or Par, all of which have stations. A realistic five-year plan is Somerset plus North Devon in one trip (10 days), north Cornwall (10 days), Penwith and the Lizard (9 days), the Roseland to Plymouth (6 days, stages 30–35), South Devon (10 days) and Dorset (7 days). Add a day or two of travel and rest to each and you have six holidays of between a week and a fortnight.

Do not add the county distances up and call the result the length of the trail. The official figure is 630 miles / 1,014 km; the stages here are measured along the mapped line, include the optional Portland circuit, and will not sum to exactly that.

The transport that makes sections work

The National Trail team's advice is that both ends of the path can be reached from London by train and bus, and that local buses run a fairly regular service along most of the coast. The railheads that matter for the options above are:

• Somerset and North Devon: Minehead is the terminus of the heritage West Somerset Railway, which runs to Bishops Lydeard on some days from March to October; the main-line station is Taunton, with a bus link. Barnstaple, at the end of the Tarka Line from Exeter, serves the Taw–Torridge estuary stages. Bude has no station.
• Cornwall: Newquay (Atlantic Coast Line), Par and Hayle (Cornish Main Line), St Ives (St Ives Bay Line from St Erth), Penzance (main line), Falmouth (Maritime Line from Truro) and Looe (Looe Valley Line) are all on or beside the path.
• South Devon: Plymouth (main line), Paignton, Torquay, Teignmouth, Dawlish and Starcross (Riviera Line), Exmouth (Avocet Line).
• Dorset: Weymouth is the end of the South West Main Line from London Waterloo via Bournemouth and Poole. From the finish at South Haven Point, the Sandbanks chain ferry runs every day of the year and the Bournemouth–Swanage bus crosses on it.

The other constraint is the water. Seventeen crossings on fifteen stages, six of them seasonal ferries and one — the Erme — a tidal wade with no boat at all. The ferries page lists every one with its season; check the operator's own times on the day you plan to cross.

Booking a section

Book the ends first, then the scarce middle nights. Supply is thin on the long cliff sections between towns — north Cornwall, north Devon and the day around the Lizard are the ones the accommodation page tells you to secure first. In late July and August you are competing with the beach holiday for every room; May, June, September and early October are cheaper, quieter and, for walking, better.