Watersmeet Circular Walk: Hoaroak Water, the East Lyn and Brendon Church
Some years ago I walked down this valley with a bishop – and 130 other people. We were on the Walk of Witness marking the 50th anniversary of the Lynmouth flood disaster of August 1952, led by Michael Langrish, then Bishop of Exeter, who strode at a cracking pace down the beautiful combe. "This walk is a sort of prayer," he told me. "Or, at least, it is if you want it to be. We are here to remember. That is the important thing."
It was a fitting way of paying one's respects to the 34 people who died that night. But all the while I found myself thinking: what a fabulous place. So I promised myself I would come back to the ravine beneath Hillsford Bridge, near Lynmouth, to observe it in more leisurely circumstances – and to find a nifty little circular walk for a perfect afternoon.
Hillsford Bridge and the meeting of the waters
The Walk of Witness began at Hillsford Bridge and, as there's a car park there, so does this walk. From here down towards the sea, the wooded valleys are owned by the National Trust – and the East Lyn river system is a national treasure, as straightforward as that. The woods are of particular ecological interest, with birch, rowan and ash among the sessile oaks, several scarce species of whitebeam, rare ferns, mosses and lichens thriving in the moist, clean air, and buzzards, redstarts, pied flycatchers and wood warblers in the trees.
At Hillsford Bridge two streams meet: Farley Water and the enigmatically named Hoaroak Water. Hoar, by the way, probably comes from an old word meaning boundary – there's a Hoar Oak a few miles upstream which marked the edge of the old Royal Forest of Exmoor.
Down Hoaroak Water to Watersmeet
The path runs down the right-hand side of the river below the bridge. In his book The Waters of Exmoor, Noel Allen writes: "The whole section is virtually one continuous cauldron of falls, with only an odd pool, and rarely a few yards of unbroken water as it drops 300 feet in 1,000 yards... Two thirds of the way along it dashes over three separate but closely connected falls, the biggest and finest series on any Exmoor river."
As you near Watersmeet the valley narrows and the path clings to a craggy corner above the tumbling stream. You turn the bend and suddenly, there before you, is the most magical cream-tea setting of them all – the National Trust's Watersmeet House, where Hoaroak Water joins the East Lyn. So sylvan, so picturesque is the place that you could be in some elfin landscape dreamt up by J. R. R. Tolkien.
Noel Allen observes, wryly: "Not one person in a million who trips across the bridge for tea or ice-cream will ever see the lonely and remote beginning of Hoaroak Water in Chains Valley." I know what he means. But on the day of the Walk of Witness I watched a large, tattooed biker sipping his tea most demurely in his leathers when, to his amazement, the fully robed bishop came marching around the corner followed by TV crews, black-clad clergy and more than a hundred walkers. "Is this some sort of pilgrimage?" he asked a press photographer. "If it is, I'll come along. I'm into that sort of thing."
Up the East Lyn to Rockford
That day we carried on down to Lynmouth. This walk takes a different turn: upstream, up the East Lyn River – one of the most spectacular and beautiful stretches of water anywhere. The stream dances and cascades into huge, deep pools where you can see brown trout lolling about in the shade of the trees. Lyn comes from an old Anglo-Saxon word meaning torrent, and along this section in particular you get the feeling this river could surge and roar even on a summer's afternoon.
Follow the path on the south bank as it weaves its way through Barton Wood before swinging towards Rockford. Before you reach that attractive little hamlet (where there's a pub, should you be interested), you meet a small lane, and our circular route takes us up it – steeply – to Brendon church.
Brendon church and back to Hillsford Bridge
Or so it is called: the village of Brendon itself is back down the valley, a couple of miles to the east. It's a lonely, wonderfully grim old church, perched some 700 feet above sea level and dedicated to St Brendan, the much-travelled Irish saint. I'm told the original church stood at Cheriton, across Farley Water and even further from the village – whenever this one was built, they've clearly always been a religious lot around here.
Now it's simply a matter of turning right at Straypark Corner and following another narrow lane as it bends round to the west and descends back to Hillsford Bridge. Much though I enjoyed walking with the bishop, these great ravines are best experienced in a more leisurely – and perhaps more solitary – way, without the press pack and the TV crews.
Watersmeet circular walk: fact file
Start: Hillsford Bridge, on the A39 south of Lynmouth, where there's a car park.
Route: down Hoaroak Water to Watersmeet, up the East Lyn River through Barton Wood towards Rockford, then up the lane to Brendon church and back along the lanes to Hillsford Bridge.
Distance and going: about four and a half miles; good paths, steep in one place.
Map: OS Explorer OL9, Exmoor.
Food and drink: the National Trust tearoom at Watersmeet (check seasonal opening) or the pub at Rockford.
More walks around Lynton and Lynmouth
