Heights and Huts of Hengistbury Head

An easy coastal loop with much to see.

Distance 3.3 miles (5.3km)

Minimum time 2hrs

Ascent/gradient 109ft (33m)

Level of difficulty Easy

Paths Grass, tarmac road, soft sand, woodland track, some steps

Landscape Heathland, sand cliffs, sand spit, mixed woodland

Suggested map aqua3 OS Explorer OL 22 New Forest

Start/finish SZ 163912

Dog friendliness Keep to paths to avoid destroying habitat and disturbing ground-nesting birds

Parking Car park (fee) at end of road, signed 'Hengistbury Head' from B3059

Public toilets Beside car park; also amid beach huts

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Directions
Background
Information

1 From the corner of the car park take the grassy path towards the sea, with the fenced-off lines of the Double Dikes to your left. At the sea-edge you can see for miles each way: to the towers of Bournemouth, the chalky Foreland and Durlston Head to the west, Christchurch Bay and the Isle of Wight to the east.

2 Turn left and follow the road along the cliffs. The Priory Church in Christchurch dominates the view inland across the harbour, with St Catherine's Hill behind. Follow the road up the hill. Pause to admire the boggy pond on your right, home to the rare natterjack toad. The road narrows; climb up some steps, passing a numbered post marking the Stour Valley Way. As you climb the steep path, the views back along the coast are fabulous, and there are views across the shallows of Christchurch Harbour, usually buzzing with windsurfers and sailing dinghies.

3 On the heathy top of Warren Hill a viewing platform tells you that you're 75 miles (120km) from Cherbourg and 105 miles (168km) from Jersey. Keep right along the path, passing a deserted coastguard station and following the top of the cliffs. Descend into a deep hollow, where the sea appears to be breaking through. Keep straight on, following the curve of the head, with views across to the Needles. At the end the path turns down through some trees; descend the steps. Walk along the sparkling, white sand on the sea side of the beach huts to the point. Stone groynes form little bays.

4 At the end of the spit you're only a stone's throw from the opposite shore (a ferry runs across to the pub from the end of a pier, passed further on). Turn round the end of the point, passing the old Black House, and walk up the inner side of the spit, overlooking the harbour.

5 If you've had enough beach and breeze, you can catch the land train back to the car park from here (times vary seasonally). Otherwise, join the metalled road which curves round to the right past the freshwater marsh and lagoon.

6 At a post marked '19' turn right on to the sandy path and follow it briefly through the woods, crossing a small ditch, to emerge back on the road. Turn right, passing extensive reedbeds on the right and a bird sanctuary on the left. Continue past the thatched barn and follow the road to the café, ranger station building and car park.

The multi-coloured beach huts of Mudeford's sandy peninsula are a cheerful throwback to nostalgic bucket-and-spade holidays of the early 20th century. In fact, they hark back to the last days of the century before that, when bathers would undress in modest little huts on wheels, which could be horse-hauled down into the shallows in order to minimise any embarrassing exposure to public view.

With the quantities of flesh readily flashed in this modern era, those days are long gone, but the carriages' successors, the huts, are still there and the desire for one's own bit of space right on the beach remains undiminished. In the fashion of the day, candy-striped paintwork has given way to bold, plain colours, but the urge to individualise remains strong, with decks, weathervanes and windmilling, semaphoring sailors.

While the huts' outer form remains much the same - central door, symmetrical windows, shallow, peaked roof - the insides are a Nosy Parker's dream. Some make the most of one light, airy space reflecting sparkling sea and sky, others may be divided into rooms, with perhaps a sleeping platform squeezed up under the roof. Each is customised with its owner's particular beach 'necessities' - minimalist fridge and drinks cabinet in one, kitchen sink and home comforts in another. Names offer a further insight into owners' identities: whimsical Riverdance stands next door to jokey Liverdance, and Tardis and Baywatch reflect the TV generations.

The windswept peninsula of Hengistbury Head has an archaeological record dating back 12,500 years, when Stone-Age hunter-gatherers left the remains of a camp site on its outer, seaward edge. Some 10,500 years later Iron-Age folk settled here and built up a trading port on the more sheltered inner shore, where Barn Field stands today. The great Double Dikes date from this later period, built to shelter a village of timber-framed dwellings.

Barn Field itself has remained untouched by farming improvements since the Romans left around ad 410 - a rare status that is jealously protected by conservationists, especially on this crowded south coast, where land is at a premium. Its vegetation is low, acidic grassland that grips on to thin soil over gravel and sand, maintained down the centuries by salt-laden winds and the sharp teeth of the rabbit population. Decimation of the rabbits in the 1950s by myxomatosis allowed gorse and bramble to gain a hold, but a recent programme of scrub clearance and controlled grazing by cattle, managed by English Nature, has done much to restore the original balance. Today it is an important site for ground-nesting birds such as the skylark and meadow pipit, and adorned with the flowers of heath bedstraw, autumn hawkbit and harebell.

While you're there

Christchurch's Priory Church dominates the view inland, looming golden above the town, and is well worth exploring. Nearby Place Mill, mentioned in the Domesday Book, was used for fulling (cleaning and thickening cloth) and corn grinding until 1808. Don't miss Christchurch's ducking stool, reached via a flagged alleyway beside the Olde George Inn. It's a wooden stool on the end of a pole which can be dipped into the millstream. This scolds' punishment was revived with good humour in 1986.

Where to eat and drink

A friendly café beside the car park serves soup and sandwiches, teas and ice cream. There's also the pleasant Hut Café on the spit, overlooking Christchurch Harbour (no dogs). Set amid the beach huts, it's open for light lunches and teas.

What to look for

The rare natterjack toad has a resonant Latin name, Bufo calamita. Once widespread on the heaths and coastal dunes of England, it has been squeezed down to just 50 breeding sites, one of which is the little boggy pond on Hengistbury Head, where they were successfully re-introduced in 1989. They breed around Easter time and leave the pond again in June.