I’ve never been fully around Sunderland or Bazil Points so walk no 18 in Mark Sutcliffe’s Cicerone Guide to Walking in Lancashire was an attractive proposition especially as it was flat as a pancake which suited my crumbling body.
I have a fear of rising tides, so the logistics for this walk were important. Tide timetables were consulted and double-checked, last Saturday looked good with a low tide at 9am. Unusually for me, I was parked up at Overton at 9am. Would my car disappear under the waves whilst I was out, I said I was nervous about the tides around Morecambe Bay. Remember the disaster in 2004 when at least 21 Chinese illegal immigrant labourers were drowned by an incoming tide whilst picking cockles off the Lancashire coast.
There was little sign of water as I walked across the causeway, just mud and marsh grass in all directions. The Sea Thrift gave the area a pink glow. A few cars passed heading to town. Soon I was at the few houses that call themselves Sunderland, once the major port for Lancaster and beyond. I wrote of the history of this place when I visited in October last year.
That time I was on my cycle so didn’t go right round the point itself. Today I continued past the last house onto the rocky shoreline and found a place to sit at the very end looking out over the Lune to Cockerham and distant Knott End. There was Plover Lighthouse seemingly on land today. As the tide was well out there were virtually no waders on the shore, just the odd shelduck, but curlews were calling in the fields behind me and goldfinches flitting through the gorse bushes. A local lady walked by and talked of the unique life here. I enjoyed the peace and the view knowing that when I turned the corner Heysham power stations would dominate the landscape.
Glaucium flavum only found on the coast.
I passed by Sambos Grave and the Camera Obscura, I couldn’t resist going inside for the upside down view. Cows were grazing on the marshes. A wild rose had the most delicate perfume.
Up at Potts’ Corner more people started to appear on the sands, presumably from the nearby caravan parks. Here I joined the zigzagging lane for half a mile before cutting across fields to use the sea wall leading back to Overton. The village is a cluster of cottages on an elevated site above the Lune. Some of the properties dating back to the C17th when it was a farming and fishing community.
I walked on to the church, one of the oldest in Lancashire. It was locked, so I couldn’t view the interior box pews and balcony. I found a seat near the Norman doorway and ate my sandwich looking over to Glasson. Then along came a gent in a tweed jacket, shorts and trilby, he cycled in to get some photos of the estuary as the tide comes in. Turns out we had mutual interests and spent a pleasant half hour chatting about this and that.
There was an old lane leading down to the shore from where at one time a ferry crossed to Glasson which looked very close. I walked around Bazil Point on the edge of the rocks, which would be difficult if the tide was in. Each gate on the way has a smart red sign. The point was as atmospheric as the one I’d walked this morning and as the tide raced in the surface of the water displayed a silver shimmering which I found mesmerising.
Ferry Cottage – considerably modernised. What a situation.
Looking back to Bazil Point.
At one stage I left the beach to walk in the fields, though I later found I needn’t have. The path left the field by a most unusual high stile down to the beach. By now I was surrounded by a herd of cows with a sturdy bull coming my way. I was glad of the escape route.
The bull is prowling at the top.
And then I was back at my car, still above the waters. What a magic area this is and well represented by Mark’s walk.
I share your nervousness parking below the tide-line in that area. Lucky escape with that bull. I think they’re supposed to ignore you when they’re in with cows, but the message doesn’t always get across.
I don’t trust bulls in any situation. That style/ladder was amazing, I descended to less threatening beasts.
I wonder if the farmer is obliged to have a bull destroyed if it chases people on a right of way, like the farmer is allowed to shoot a dog if it chases livestock.
There is some law stating that a bull is allowed in a field with cows if it is of a dairy breed, or is it a beef breed? The public don’t know the difference anyhow. I stay well clear.
That walk looks so beautiful especially with all the sea pinks out. We have never done it, Wil thinks we are bound to get cut off by the tide and he won’t yet be persuaded. Oneday! Oh my god, I can’t believe you got surrounded by cows and bull too. Phew for that ingenious escape route!
It is easy to check the tide timetables and then give yourself plenty of time. The road is only cut off 2 hours either side of high tide, or that’s the theory.
Maybe avoid Bazil Point whilst the cattle are out!
Haha yes definitely 😛
Looks like I did the same walk excluding round Sunderland Point on 3rd. February 2020 and you commented:
https://conradwalks.blogspot.com/search?q=Sunderland+Point
I don’t think OS shows a path round the point so that’s why I suppose I didn’t do that. It all makes an interesting walk.
A lot of people walk around Sunderland Point when the tide is out.
WordPress appears to have picked up on a WordPress blog I was setting up years ago but never actioned. That title “Array” has no significance for me.
I wondered where it had come from, my blog labelled it as spam initially.
Another walk to tempt the ‘taste buds’ BC. You are slowly moving through the book…
That could be the last for a while as I seem to have developed Plantar Fasciitis in the other heel now. The body seems to be slowly falling to bits. Expect more cycle trips.
Sorry to hear of your new foot injury, BC, I hope it gets better soon.
M
Seems to be one thing after another.
I’ve posted here before about the walk around around Sunderland point and it’s exclusion from the Lancashire Coastal Way.
It’s a regular local dog walk for me living in Heysham, but recently I have been toying with the idea of walking the shoreline from Overton around Bazil point then along the fringe of Colloway Marsh right up to (Snatchems by) The Golden Ball pub at Oxcliffe Hill. There is no defined path but at low tide I believe it would be possible on the shore line as we do around Sunderland. Unfortunately the pub, with its notorious history has been closed since March 2020; hopefully it will find a new owner who will not destroy it’s unique charm by renovating it within an inch of it’s life and turn it into one of the soulless establishments of recent years.
You are lucky to have those paths on your doorstep. Best of luck along that next bit of shoreline, there look to be some significant inlets.
I stopped by the Golden Ball on a day out just a month ago and was told by a resident of the static caravan park next door that the place is supposed to be re-opening in July. If it is then someone needs to get a move on as it looked a heck of a mess outside – someone must be living there though as there were a couple of young kids riding bikes round the side.
Some people have fanciful ideas.
If you manage to get to Overton another time BC then try the church door again. I thought it was locked when I went but one of the church people told me it’s never usually locked, it’s just the latch that’s faulty – if you turn the handle you think it’s locked but if you turn the square bit it should open.
Yes somebody told me that but by then I was on my home. In the past I’ve been inside to see the box pews and gallery.