Length: 9.3 km

Duration: 4:35

Total ascent/descent: 335/-251 m

Max/min slope: 29%/-21%

Wayfinding: easy. However, access to Chapman’s Pool was hazardous, with one part requiring abseiling on a slope (not vertical).

Weather: Cloudy. Some sun at Chapman’s Pool, thankfully.

Dinner: The Square and Compass

Overnight: Weston Farm Campsite

Corfe Common

A morning stroll to see a stream train, buy a picnic for lunch, and take more photos of the castle.

Leaving the town through Corfe Common in the south, the castle still dominated. The paths shown in the OS Maps all had been diverted, so just go in your general direction.

Kingston

Kingston was a small village with an outsized, new-looking church. The houses in grey stones and thick roof tiles continued from Corfe, and were all the more striking in smaller numbers, with trees and fields as a backdrop.

Excellent views of Purbeck Hills and the castle.

Chapman’s Pool

We wanted to stop at Chapman’s Pool especially and it did not disappoint. The beach was part sandy, part shingle and part rocky. It was backed against a black cliff of soft and crumbly slate that had a wobble and rockfall while we were there. Without all the other visitors there, it would have been wild and bleak (and still beautiful).

The water was not as clear as at Worbarrow Bay, probably because of the black slate, but still a delight to swim in.

Worth Matravers

The last time we walked past Worth Matravers we couldn’t find the Weston Farm campsite. It was now operated by the National Trust and probably one of the best campsites I had stayed at. Clean facilities, extremely generous spaces between pitches, no cars on pitches, thick mown grass: it felt like wild camping.

The Square and Compass was the same watering hole for all the London holidaymakers and bemused locals, serving good beer and pastes. It was an irritating place but impossible to dislike.

The greyness of the Purbeck stones and tiles were the most stark on the houses of Worth Matravers. They gave no relief from the expansive and parched landscape; instead together they wove an austere kind of beauty, together with the opprresive heat from the enveloping sky. It was a harsh, elemental place.