Margam to Porthcawl – Wales Coast Path

After days of rain we risked a 10.5 mile walk along the stretch of the coastal path from Margam to Porthcawl. The weather forecast was changeable, but we were lucky to reach Porthcawl before it poured down!

The walk from Margam has the constant, dominating backdrop of Tata Steel works. Even walking through Kenfig Burrows alongside the Nature reserve (a site of special scientific interest) you still glimpse the works in the distance.

The beach which runs alongside the Burrows from Porthcawl to Port Talbot glistens in the bleak winter sun.

Sker beach, unofficially a naturist beach is deserted apart from a few horse riders and a single dog walker – all clothed!!

Sker Point was the tragic scene of the disaster which struck the US built Samtampa – which got caught in a gale on the 23 April 1947.  Eight lifeboat men from the Mumbles and the 39 sailors from ‘The Samtampa’ were killed.

The yellow washed Sker House can be seen from the path, R D Blackmore in 1872 wrote the novel “The Maid of Sker” – he eventually went on to write Lorna Doone.  The real Maid of Sker was a young lass, called Elizabeth Williams who was forced into a loveless marriage by her father Isaac Williams, despite the fact that the young lass was madly in love with a harp playing carpenter. There has been a house on the site for 900 years but it was remodelled in the 16th century.

The path takes us alongside the prestigious Royal Porthcawl Golf Club, founded in 1891, by a bunch of Cardiff businessmen. As well as the golfers, a small group of surfers were out to sea on Rest Bay, a hardy lot. The sky darkening, we stopped off for a cuppa near the Harbour before calling it a day as the rain came down, and my rubber boots split at the seams!


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