The Salt Path

We went to see The Salt Path film recently and there are quite a few familiar locations that feature in it (although they don’t always feature in the correct sequence for travelling the coastal path east to west across North Devon and Cornwall). The Salt Path is an adaptation of the bestselling novel by Raynor Wynn recounting the walk she and her husband, Moth, did along the S. W. Coastal Path after the losing their farm and his diagnosis of Corticobasal degeneration (CBD). They are played in the film by Gillian Andresona and Jason Issacs. The trailer can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQ7RJCOm-c8

The main filming locations that we identified that are relatively close to Appledore (and places that you might wish to visit either because you have seen the film or just go there as they are all great places to visit) are:

The Valley of the Rocks (which is near Lynton and Lynmouth) which is where they see the resident wild goat population. This is actually a great place to do a walk if you are heading to Lynton/Lynmouth, which are about 45 minutes away from Appledore and interesting places to visit anyway. You may want to take the funicular railway when travelling between the two (especially uphill i.e. Lynmouth to Lynton) as the hill between the two is pretty steep.

Hartland/ Hartland Quay. The geography around Hartland is quite distinctive with massive folds in the coastal rock formations. Hartland is probably one of our favourite places to do a 1.5-2h circular walk – what we enjoy is parking up in the small village of Stone (you can park in the church car park except when services are being held) and then follow a path down the hill at the end of the church which takes you down to the valley floor. From there you can take the marked path on the left through a 5 bar gate which takes you across a field then into woods following the path of the stream down to the coast. This path runs parallel to the path you can take from Hartland Abbey which you can use if you visit there (although it is only open Easter – September, whereas the alternative path is open all year). The path takes you down to Blackpool Mill which features in the film as a pub – if you see the film it is the white building at the base of a steep downward path (and this scene is also briefly in the film’s trailer). There is also a scene where they briefly pass Harland Abbey at night.

Clovelly is quite prominent in the film, with a scene of Raynor and Moth walking up the main (steep) cobbled street in the village before ending up at the visitor centre at the top of the village. Clovelly is a very popular, and in summer quite busy, place to visit – probably about 30 minutes drive from Appledore itself. If you are staying at the cottage, there is more information about Clovelly and walks that you can do around there in the “downloadable information for guests” area of the website.

Hawker’s Hut is close to the village of Morwenstow. It’s quite unusual, and very small! It is one of the places we visited while e-biling (see separate post on that) and it is easily accessed easily accessed on a short walk : https://www.southwestcoastpath.org.uk/walksdb/682/

The final notable North Devon location is Ilfracombe (rather later in the film than the route would suggest). There are at least a couple of scenes there including shots of the harbour area and in the town itself.

For anyone completing the 668 miles of the SW Coastal path is a major achievement which takes people a couple of months to do (and that is good going) how about doing it in less than 2 weeks! If you look at our post on e-biling you will see that we did this with Dave Myers. In addition to the guiding he does from his base in Mornenstow he also undertakes some epic journeys, one of which was a record breaking self-supported 13days 13h 43 minutes to complete the whole S W Coastal Path. You can have a look at his write up here: https://www.southwestcoastpath.org.uk/walksdb/682/