Nearest Landscape & Nature Cornwall

Stepper Point sits at the Western tip of Camel estuary by Padstow in Cornwall, and rises to 74m (242ft) at its highest point. You get some pretty spectacular scenery here on the South West Coast path. Some high cliffs with hidden bays and covers below. Most being too risky to climb down to. If you were to start off in Padstow this makes a nice walk with great views. The headland at Stepper Point is topped by a stone tower, built as a day mark to serve as a navigation beacon for seafarers.

St George’s Island is also known as Looe Island, a small island about a mile offshore from Looe in Cornwall. Owned and managed by the Cornwall Wildlife Trust charity. The Island is approx. 22.5 acres (9 ha) in area and a mile (1.6 km) in circumference with the highest point being only 47 metres (154 ft). The landing fees and other income is devoted to conserving the island’s natural beauty and providing facilities. Open during the summer to day visitors arriving by the Trust’s boat from Looe. A small visitor centre can provide you with a self-guided trail map.  

Bodmin Beacon Local Nature Reserve covers some 87 acres of traditionally managed farmland, public space and community woodland. The reserve has a range of paths that criss-cross the area and woodland. The Beacon is a rounded hill and at its highest point of 162m has the 44m monument to Sir Walter Raleigh Gilbert built in 1857. The reserve has a small car park and picnic area but no toilet facilities.

Kit Hill is a rugged granite hilltop between Callington and the River Tamar. The hill rises to a height of 334m and has some of the best views in the southeast Cornwall, with sights including the Tamar Valley, Dartmoor and Bodmin Moor. On the summit, you have the “Summit Stack” built in 1858 for the mining complex and served a steam engine that pumped water and lifted ore from the deep mine workings. The Kit Hill Country Park consists of some 400 acres (152 hectares), where Kit Hill is the highest point in the Tamar Valley Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

Cape Cornwall (Cornish: “Pen Kernow”) is a small headland four miles north of Land’s End near the town of St Just. Cape Cornwall was once thought to be the most westerly point in mainland England, however following accurate surveying Land’s End was found to be the most westerly point instead. Cape Cornwall is the approximate point at which Atlantic currents split, either going south up the English Channel or north into the Bristol Channel and the Irish Sea. The Brisons, two offshore rocks, are located approximately one mile southwest of Cape Cornwall and mark the start of the annual swim to Priest’s Cove. Most of the headland is owned by the National Trust and is part of the Cornish Mining World Heritage Site. There is also a National Coastwatch look out on the seaward side.

Brown Willy (from Cornish: Bron Wennyly meaning swallows’ hill) is a hill in Cornwall popular with walkers and hiking. The summit is the highest point of Bodmin Moor and of Cornwall as a whole.

Seal Island is the largest island in The Carracks, a group of small rocky inshore islands 200m offshore and around 6km from St Ives. The island gets its name as it’s the home to a colony of Grey Atlantic seals. You have two options to see the seals; (1) is by a Seal Island boat trip from St Ives harbour or (2) with a set of binoculars from the coast path.  

Port Hellick Beach sits in a sheltered tidal inlet on St Mary’s south coast and the beach at low tide offers a wide expanse of sand and rocks. This is not really a location for sitting on the beach but offers a great natural landscape. A shingle bar provides a freshwater pool (Higher Moors and Porth Hellick Pool)  behind the beach that is a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) for the ″wide diversity of habitats with several rare and notable plant species″and making this an important stop-off for migrating and wintering birds. Sir Cloudesley Shovell, Admiral of the Fleet was temporarily buried on the beach after he was washed up here when his ship struck the rocks on 22nd October 1707, with the loss of her entire crew of about 800 men. Sir Cloudesley Shovell’s body, along with the bodies of his two stepsons and that of Captain Edmund Loades, were washed up on Porth Hellick Cove the following day. The body was subsequently exhumed by order of Queen Anne and finally laid to rest in Westminster Abbey on 22nd December 1707. A small memorial marker marks the site where he was washed ashore. The beach has no facilities.

Mullion Cove Harbour is a working small protected harbour cmpleted in the 1890s. Whilst the village has a wonderful collection of shops, pubs, cafes, restaurants, and art galleries. In the centre of the village, the 15th century church of St Mellanus with its carved oak bench-ends depicting biblical scenes.

Dodman Point is a 400-foot (120 m) high headland that was once an Iron Age promontory fort. At its seaward end is a large granite cross, erected to help protect shipping from this headland. It is mentioned in the shanty Spanish Ladies. Below the large stone cross, there is a way down to the bottom of the small cliffs and there is some climbing there on the faces. Mainly bouldering as it is rarely climbed and so there are no fixed anchor points.

St Michael’s Mount, a rocky island crowned with medieval church and castle. One of England’s most famous and dramatic coastal attractions. The oldest surviving buildings date from the 12th century, when a Benedictine priory was founded here. Accessible on foot at low tide across a causeway, at other times it is reached by a short boat trip. The island is managed by the National Trust and includes cafe/restaurant and shop. The gardens have limited opening times as they can’t cope with the large amount of summer visitors, see the National Trust website for more information.