Ballycotton CliffWalk

For information on Ballycotton CliffWalk email:
walking@ballycotton.com

An invigorating coastal walk, with abundant, interesting plantlife, starting and finishing in the scenic East Cork village.

A warm autumn day, with the sea blue and glittering beneath a cloudless sky, is the perfect time to walk this coastal path. But to watch sunlight breaking through grey clouds over a winter sea is equally enchanting.

The old cliff top path, newly refurbished and now called the Ballycotton CliffWalk, begins at the village.

It passes Ballytrasna and then turns inland at the small cove at Ballyandreen, to make a loop back to Ballycotton. The local development committee hopes this path can be extended - but for the moment it is a very pleasant 5 miles, with a shorter route home of 3 miles, through Ballytrasna.

At Ballycotton Pier a worn path begins, with a sign warning "Dangerous Cliffs Ahead'. The CliffWalk committee does not recommend this route, but bathers use it to reach "Healy's", where they swim off the rocks in summer. The path continues past "Healy's" to a car park, above the cliffs, where the approved walk begins.

This car park is more safely reached via a road swinging right uphill from the village just before the pier. As you will be walking high above the sea for more than a mile anyway, the "Healy's" stretch is unnecessary, and also involves a steep climb. At the car park an elegant information board, entitled Ballycotton Cliff Walk, depicts the local bird species. Based on information from Phil Davis, local bird watcher and outgoing chairman of the Cork Branch of BirdWatch Ireland, it was painted by David Daly of Wexford. It is one of eighteen plaques erected at prime bird viewing sites on the new East Cork Bird Trail between Cork and Youghal.

Behind us is Ballycotton Island, a dramatic sight topped by a landmark lighthouse. Between it and the shore is a smaller island, grazed by a few goats. The lighthouse went automatic in 1992, having been a manned station from its construction in 1851. The coast is fraught with dangerous rocks, and there were many shipwrecks over the centuries. The Ballycotton lifeboat has figured in many valiant rescues over the years.

A concrete stile gives access to the pathway. There are many stiles on the route, much more convenient than climbing walls or ducking under electric fences while, at the same time, keeping farm animals from wandering. Our route is a narrow foot-worn track along the cliff top, with the sea far below and the air coming off the Atlantic fresh and stimulating.

Fulmars nest on these cliffs and can be seen riding the air currents above and below. Looking like small, stiff winged gulls with double-barrelled beaks, they are breathtaking to watch as they glide gracefully and effortlessly. First breeding in Ireland in 1911 (they live to be 35 years old) they are now common on sea cliffs almost all around our coasts.

Offshore is the famous Daunt Rock. In 1936, the Daunt Lightship broke loose from its moorings nearby and drifted in mountainous seas. Those aboard were saved by the brave efforts of the crew of the Ballycotton lifeboat.

The wildflowers along the path are luxuriant and change with the season. The sea pinks and golden trefoil are spectacular in spring, with bladder campion and blue 'corn flowers' (scabious) prominent in mid-summer. Now, in autumn, Western dwarf gorse carpets the rough ground, mixed with purple heather.

You pass a bathing spot called Paradise, reached by a precipitous path and broken concrete steps. The descent is only for the sure-footed but it is a popular place to swim, and young people gather there on summer Sundays. A song by Larry Wren jokes that Paradise is to be found at Ballycotton.

Erosion has taken the ground away in places and the sheer cliffs are sometimes sensibly fenced off. The sea breaks over black rocks far below. You may well see grey seals as they are common hereabouts, their flat heads (males) or round heads (females and pups) poking out of the water, watching you with as much curiosity as you watch them. On fine days gannets, white birds with sharp black wing tips, are often seen plummeting into the ocean, a sure sign of sand-eels and mackerel. In July and August parties of graceful white terns, with black caps, fly by, shrieking and diving into the sea after sprats. Cormorants stand on the rocks, black and angular, silhouetted against the glittering sea as they hang out their wings to dry.

You pass a shelter, a rest hut which is most useful if you are caught in the rain. Drawn by the wild flowers, butterflies are abundant along the path - brightly coloured wall butterflies, small blues and painted ladies taking nectar from the purple knapweed. In autumn, red admirals, tortoiseshells and speckled wood will be seen. Hunting kestrels hover overhead, hanging as if from a sky hook, then gliding hundreds of metres without a wing-beat.

On a clear day, you can see as far as the Old Head of Kinsale, with its lighthouse, past Powers Point and the Sovereigns, black stacks like peaks rising from the sea. At Ballytrasna, a small stream is bridged by wooden steps with a handrail and a path leads inland to join the road, with a right turn taking one back to Ballycotton. The path continues, with other steps leading down to a small cove popular with holidaymakers in summer.

On the rocks below the path, rock samphire grows luxuriantly. It was once prized as a vegetable, its sharp, lemony tang adding zest to salads. Bracken, gorse and heather border the route on both sides.

Stonechats, small colourful birds (the male with striking russet breast, black head and white collar), flit amongst the briars and sing from high shoots or fence posts.

After a gentle climb you reach a dramatic headland. Here you may pause and enjoy the panoramas over the sea and up and down the coast with its rock outcrops, cliffs and coves. Ballyandreen Bay is ten minutes ahead, with Dooneenmacotter, a shingle beach with a couple of boats drawn up, immediately behind. At low tide the strand is fronted by a reef of extensive rock platforms, pitted with hundreds of rock pools.

These miniature aquariums are well worth exploring, clear as crystal, with pink coraline, brown sea oak, green sea lettuce and many of the agar seaweeds growing on the sides. Snakelock anemones, with many sinuous fingers like a Medusa head, cling to the sides, along with brilliant beadlet anemones, winkles, whelks and limpets. Specialist fish like shannies, gobies and scorpion fish inhabit the crevices and pipe fish, small crabs and prawns can be found hiding in the weed.

From the beach, an unpaved road winds inland, through Ballyandreen, a settlement of pretty cottage conversions with a green roadside water pump. A lovely old farmhouse and farmyard is passed on the left. The canopy of trees provides welcome shade on hot summer days. After a quiet kilometre, you reach a crossroads and turn right for Ballycotton along a straight country road, flanked with bungalows as you near the village. An ancient roadside outhouse has the surreal feature of an exhaust pipe sticking out of the gable.

You pass the pathway coming up from Ballytrasna Cove on the right, and then the Marine and Cliff Rescue station.

At the T Junction, you turn sharp right beside the pretty C of I church, now deconsecrated. Here, a fine display of flowering fuchsia is on show in early autumn.

The right turn takes us down the colourful village street, high over the sea. You pass the Post Office, small houses, large villas in the seaside style, an impressive Marian Shrine, Spanish Point Restaurant with tables overlooking the harbour, and the Bayview Hotel. The street divides. The right fork takes us back to the starting point at the car park. A short walk left provides a view of the colourful harbour with piers and fishing boats and Ballycotton Island beyond.