Interlude: The South Downs Way. Day 1: Eastbourne to Firle 17.5 miles

The last part of the HoLEwalk is scheduled for September, so we thought we’d do a long distance taster walk as training. We were going to Eastbourne anyway for my sister Janet’s Golden Wedding celebrations, so the South Downs Way seemed a perfect fit.

Eastbourne is one of those coastal towns teetering on the edge; not as vibrant as Brighton but nowhere near the desolation of Bognor Regis. There is an air of the dowager duchess about it, but a recent influx of younger residents, including Brighton University students, is breathing in a new lease of life (fingers crossed).

The region has been inhabited since Stone Age times, but the modern day town is largely the fever dream of the Victorian William Cavendish, later the Duke of Devonshire, who commissioned architect, Henry Currey, to plan the town. The result is a glorious mixture of turrets, wedding cake houses and every Victorian embellishment imaginable complete with a gold-domed pier designed by pier engineer extraordinaire Eugenius Birch. As you exit the pier today, the sign states that you are now leaving ‘Sheikh’s Pier’: it is owned by a Sheikh Abid Gulzar.

We were a bit confused about the start of the walk. No guidebook or website was exactly clear about where it was. We walked to the end of the pier just in case, but the general view seemed to be that it starts symbolically at the Wish Tower. This is tower 73 of 74 Martello towers built to defend the South Coast in the 1800s during the Napoleonic wars. There are no South Downs Way signs at the Wish Tower, however, and the first sign and official start appears to be just past Holywell on the western side of the town, together with the Wealdway and the 6 mile Jubilee Way for good measure.

There are a huge network of paths going from here past a cliff top cricket ground up to Beachy Head: a steep climb but not too arduous. We met the first of several German school parties on the way up, smiling and laughing in the sunshine. As we neared the top, however, the gentle, westerly, sea breeze on the promenade became a gusting headwind, almost knocking us off our feet. One of the problems with walking from east to west in the UK is that you tend to be walking into the weather. Rich’s spirits were lifted, though, as we arrived at the primary trig point at the top. The first of two for the today and we could see the other, Firle Beacon, clearly on the horizon.

From there, it was down again and then up towards the Belle Tout lighthouse. It hasn’t rained for days so the chalky ground was stony hard. This also meant that the wind whipped up the chalk grit and periodically sand blasted it onto us. I won’t need to exfoliate for months!

The tourist crowds were confused by the sunny/overcast, windy weather wearing everything from a speculative bikini to full waterproof trousers and coat. Next it was down to Birling Gap, which has toilets and a National Trust cafe. Conveniently situated between Beachy Head and the Seven Sisters, it serves as a useful staging point for coaches and touring cars. We queued for the toilets and then headed off without stopping for refreshments.

What goes down must come up and ascend the first of the Seven Sisters, of which there are eight. It looks as if the actual South Downs were washed into the sea at this point and you are walking up and down successive hill shoulders with the valleys in between, rather than along a ridge. The constant up and down into a sharp headwind was knackering. My boss, Rebecca, had warned me about this section as she once did it at the beginning of a 50km day walk (!).

There was nowhere to shelter out of the wind, so we decided to keep going until we headed inland at Cuckmere Haven. We soon found a calmer spot to stop for a break. I messaged Rebecca “Have just finished Beachy Head and the ‘Seven’ Sisters. The sooner they fall into the bloody sea the better.” They are receding at a rate of 70cm/year, so it won’t be too long.

We carried on, leaving the coast, and were soon ascending a grassy hill, frequented by skylarks and swallows and the occasional kestrel. The contrast between this landscape and the chalk cliffs a mile away was stark. We were soon descending again, however, with the Cuckmere river meandering dramatically alongside us.

Crossing the A259, the South Downs Way joins the Vanguard Way, a 66 mile route from Croydon to Newhaven launched by the Vanguard Rambling Club in 1981. The Vanguard Rambling Club was established on 18th April 1965 by a group of walkers travelling back from Devon to London. Unable to find seats, they travelled home together in the guard’s van, and thereafter became known as the‘Vanguards’.

The nature of the route then completely changed, becoming green and forested; as unexpected as it was magical. The land was now quite broken rather than being part of a true chalk escarpment. The signs for the South Downs Way here depict this jumble of hills, nicely illustrating the undulating nature of the terrain.

After following the hill for a while, and admiring the 1924 white horse scraped into the hillside, we lolloped down into the hamlet of Litlington. Spotting The Plough and Harrow pub, we popped in for pints of orange juice and tonic, hoping to surreptitiously eat our lunch in the beer garden. The pub, however, was busy with lots of people eating outside as well as inside, despite it being a Monday lunchtime. We headed off up the road, oblivious to the shortcut to the path from the pub garden.

We headed back to the river, spying our first herons and swans, and soon found a comfortable place for our lunch and a brief snooze. We continued along the Cuckmere, crossing a footbridge into the pretty village of Alfriston.

On our way into the village, we spotted a ‘Monksy’. One of two pieces of modern Latin graffiti in Alfristo, spray painted by an unknown artist. Alfriston also had a tempting village shop. We bought cakes and tea and sat on a bench in the village square watching the traffic struggle to negotiate mediaeval roads with 21st century vehicles. It was our third stop in an hour and didn’t bode well.

Feeling a bit more rested, we set off upwards again, finally attaining the proper chalk escarpment of the South Downs, with the sea southwards, the North Downs (the hills of my childhood) northwards and the Weald between the two downland ridges. The path was now a way that had been used for millennia, with several tumuli and a long barrow beside the route.

We climbed Bostal Hill, dipped down to a car park and then started off up to Firle Beacon, at 217m, the highest point of the walk so far and another primary trig point for Richard’s collection. From here, we could look back to Beachy Head, and admire our progress.

We then headed away from the Way, off the ridge to our destination: the Ram Inn in Firle, desperate for a shower and some rest following over 3000 feet of ascent (and descent) and nearly 44,000 steps.

Total distance: 17.5 miles