Ep 13: Best Weston-super-Mare walks – tips from the locals

Introduction to our local Weston experts:

Paul Batts is owner of Outdoors & Active, an award-winning, nationally-recognised, outdoor and clothing shop, that brings a lot of walkers into Weston-super-Mare for their specialist projects. He’s also the chairman for the Business Improvement District for the town, which looks after businesses in the town centre, and does things to make Weston a nicer place for people to live, work, visit and invest in.

Paul moved to Weston some 20 years ago, and started his business about 17 years ago, because it was an opportunity between Taunton and Bristol. 

Paul started small, as he didn’t know what to expect and wasn’t sure how to appeal to people, but over the years the business has grown and grown. There was a market for “quality products with personal service” – their tagline. People love the conversation and the information they can get from Outdoors & Active – that’s what you don’t get from the chains these days, especially with footwear. Walkers come from all over the country to talk to them about foot problems and walking footwear. During those conversations, Paul is sure to tell them all the nice things to go and look at in Weston, or somewhere to go and eat – acting as a little bit of an ambassador for Weston. 

They now have more specialist suppliers wanting to supply them because they’ve become a real destination shop, voted Britain’s Best Independent Outdoor Shop, they also made the final of Britain’s Best Small Shop – the only shop from Somerset to make it.

Of Weston, Paul says “as a place to live and work, Weston’s incredible. Jane has a similar walk along the seafront to work, – it’s a great way to start or end the day, rather than being stuck in your car in traffic… I think that’s why Weston is seeing a sort of exodus from the cities, because here, you can be home quite quickly. Or if you’re walking home, you can admire the view and it’s freeing your mind from what’s been happening during the day.”

Jane Murch is Visitor and Information Services Manager for Visit Weston. She is responsible for tourism in the town, including people that come for day trips, and stay in Weston. 

Jane grew up in Weston – her parents owned a newsagent near the seafront. After moving to London for six months, she ended up staying away for 16 years! She came back to live in Weston with her family in 2016, and hasn’t looked back. 

Tell us about some of your favourite walks 

Paul: The seafront promenade

Weston is brilliant, especially for people who bring in elderly relatives or parents with children, because we have a long flat seafront with that beautiful vista. From there, you can go and do something ambitious, or you can find a nice coffee shop and have a bite to eat.

Also, a lot of people want to do their 10,000 steps a day. It’s two miles long, so if you do the seafront there and back, that’s your 10,000 steps for the day – it’s a nice, simple way for people who are getting into walking or just want to register something for fitness. 

The South West Coast Path

From Weston, you can go all the way across to Brean and from there, you can make your way down (if you’re ambitious) and join the South West Coast Path.

Sand Point

Going the other way, you can walk right across to Sand Point, and then more things open up towards Clevedon. 

Weston Woods

Or, just head up the slopes and into the woods at Weston – there’s such diversity. There you’ll also find a blue plaque, ,marking where former US President Eisenhower slept in a caravan in Weston Woods!

There is a loop walk in the woods, and there are some smaller individual trails, but mostly you want to get up there for the spectacular views over the bay. Then it’s a matter of whether you come back down into town, or come back down on the Sand Point side, and head back into town that way.

There’s a beautiful view if you walk up from Birnbeck Pier, on a pathway that takes you up over the top. If you stand there, you can see over Birnbeck, then out to Sand Point, Sand Bay and on a clear day, across to Wales. 

If you stand almost behind the church, there’s a clear cutting where the trees have cleared and there is an absolutely stunning view across the whole of Weston Bay. You can see as far as Uphill, and on a clear day, you can see all the way across to Somerset and Hinkley Point Power Station being built in the background. 

Jane: Uphill

Uphill is my go-to place to walk with my dogs. We have a small wood in Uphill, commonly known as Bluebell Woods – that’s beautiful, it’s fairly flat. There are a couple of steep hills, which if you’ve got dogs and the weather’s warm, it’s the best place to go, because it’s under shelter and quite cool. It’s lovely just to have a bit of a mooch around and in the spring, the bluebells and the snowdrops are absolutely stunning.

Uphill is quite undulating. If you start at the bottom of the hill, it’s quite a steep walk up to St. Nicholas Church at the top. There you can go around the back, and onto the Brean Down Cycle Path, which is beautiful. It’s very easy to walk, it’s accessible. Again, it can be quite hilly, but it’s tarmac, so it’s quite an easy walk. It takes you out through nature reserves and some of the views there can be wonderful.

Going to the fort in Brean as well – it’s that furthest point that you can see jutting out of the landscape. 

Discover more Uphill walks here

Mendip Walk

I (Jane) worked for Weston Hospice Care for a while and one of the mass participation challenges that we did was the Mendip Challenge. You could choose between a 30-mile, a 20-mile or a 10-mile walk. 

As one of the organisers, one of the things that I had to do on a regular basis was check the walks to make sure that nothing had changed since the last walk. I got very into walking the 10-mile walk, which would take you from Weston into Hutton, up over the top of Canada Coombe, Bleadon and then back down into Weston via Uphill.

It takes you to some quite steep hills that you have to clamber up, but once you get to the top of Canada Coombe in Bleadon, the views are remarkable. On a clear day you can see as far as Glastonbury Tor and over the Somerset Levels. 

Mendip Way

The Mendip Way is a brilliant one. It’s 50 miles in total, broken into a 30-mile and a 19-mile. It’s a little more challenging in places, but the rewards are spectacular. You can eventually carry on through it and end up at Cheddar Gorge. 

From Brean Down, you can head towards the South West Coast Path. That’s a 64-mile hike, so you’ve got to be pretty ambitious to do that, but then you’re on the start of some 500 miles of coast path. We’ve only ever had one customer do that in one go. A lot of people will pick weekends or holidays, and go and pick sections to do, so that they’re slowly ticking it all off.

Are there buses if you get to Brean, and want to get yourself back?

There’s a frequent bus that leaves between Brean and Weston. That’s a shuttle bus that goes backwards and forwards. Taxi would be an obvious one as well. We don’t have Uber, but who’s to say that it won’t come? 

Brean itself is a big tourism destination, it has many caravan parks, so there’s always taxi ranks there. There are always buses to and from, so there’s a way of getting backwards and forwards. If you do find yourself stuck and not wanting to walk back.

There is a new coastal path opening, part of the King Charles III England Coast Path. What do you both know about it?

Jane: It starts in Aust, South Gloucestershire and goes all the way down to Wain’s Hill in Clevedon, Somerset. The first stage between Sand Bay, near Weston-super-Mare and Brean Down Fort in Somerset, opened in June 2022. The remaining phases aim to be completed by the end of 2024 enabling a continuous walking route to the Somerset coastline and beyond. It will be the first time that people have been able to walk along the coast between South Gloucestershire, through Bristol City Council’s area (around Avonmouth) and North Somerset.

The final stretch – from Wain’s Hill in Clevedon to Sand Bay, north of Weston-super-Mare – is the remaining section. 

We’re very lucky here in Weston that we do have walker’s pass through that are doing the guided walks of the UK, the majority of them are doing it for charity. We’ll often see people walk through the town that have been on big walks around the whole of the country. We’ve had a number in the last couple of weeks, and we always try to reach out to them, to make sure that we buy them a coffee and some food and breakfast, and a chance to talk to them. 

Paul: It’s fabulous, it’s going to be another addition to our arsenal in Weston, and another reason to bring people through our area and discover what we have to offer. 

One of the great things about Weston is, more often than not, it surprises people, whether they come here for a walk, or to visit someone, or for business, they go away really surprised, and thinking there’s a lot more there here than they initially thought.

On 30 September, Weston Museum is going to be celebrating King Charles III England Coast Path with walks and workshops. National Trails has set that up and it’s been led by Natural England.

The section in purple on this map will be completed by the end of 2024.

North Somerset Council manages and maintains all the Public Rights of Way in and around Weston-super-Mare, and across North Somerset. This includes public footpaths and bridleways, restricted byways and byways open to all traffic. To report a problem with a public path or right of way, and for an interactive map showing all the routes around the area, visit the council’s website.

How important is it to have health tourism in Weston-super-Mare? 

Jane: One of the projects that we’ve been looking at is Active Weston. Walking is obviously key to that and we are very lucky that we have so much in the local area. We’ve also been looking at water sports and land-based sports, but walking is fundamentally the main part of the Active Weston programme. 

Dog-walking in Weston

I spend an awful lot of time out and about talking to people. We have quite a mixed range of people, daytrippers, that will drive for a day out with their dog. They come because we’ve got the prom, we’ve got the beach.

From October, dogs are allowed on the beach until 1 May between The Grand Pier and Royal Sands. In summer dogs can go on the beach before 9am and after 7pm (but not around Marine Lake). There are no restrictions for dog-walking between The Grand Pier and Knightstone Island or Royal Sands and Uphill beach at any time of year.

We have this vast amount of space, and walks, whether it be up through the  woods, whether it be down into Sand Bay onto Sand Point, whether the kids are on bikes and the adults are walking, there’s so much opportunity for families.

The train from Bristol is only half an hour, some people bundle the dog on the train and they will come down to Weston for the day. 

The South West Coast path, which starts from Minehead, is around 630 Miles and there’s a very beautiful book about it, called Salt Path by Raynor Winn. She is going to be a special guest at the Weston Literary Festival in October.

When people do come for a walk in Weston, what accommodation is available?

Jane: We have a number of traditional Bed and Breakfast guest houses in Weston, a lot of which are dog-friendly as well as self-catering on the seafront. We also have shepherd’s huts, a bit further out of town. 

Check the Visit Weston website for dog-friendly accommodation as well as other places to stay.

Are the walking paths on the Visit Weston website?

Yes, there is an area of walks in and around Weston on the website.

There’s also an area called let us inspire you  – if you’re looking for food, things to do, accommodation, food and drink, a night out etc the website is a great place to go and source information. Weston used to be a summer destination, we’re now a year-round destination. There’s always something happening in our town.

You’re going to be moving into The Mercury Building. What’s that going to look like for you? 

We will have a new information hub, which will be open to visitors to the town, as well as local people. My long term plan would be that Visit Weston is the go-to place to find anything that you need to know for Weston. Whether you’re a family visiting, wanting to book attractions in the local area, I’d like the website to act as a box office in traditional terms, as well as featuring every bit of information that you need to know about Weston – that’s my ideal.

Paul, you’re in one of the village areas of Weston. Tell us more about that.

We’re located in Orchard Meadows, which is just off of the high street. Orchard Meadows and Grove Village are both really popular little independent areas in Weston, and so diverse. 

Next to me is an amazing vintage clothing shop, further down the road, you’ve got Christopher’s Chocolates, Rose & Amber, the Atlantic Fish Bar. There are really good eateries in Grove Village.

What is an interesting fact that people outside Weston Super Mare do not know about?

Paul: The one that surprises most people is that Weston is now bigger than Bath in terms of population. People think we’re just this sleepy little seaside town on the coast, but we’re a growing population and so many people love to come here.

What’s the most underrated thing about Weston that you wish that people would get?

Jane: The beach and the sea. Yes, we do have a brown sea but that’s because we have one of the highest tidal ranges in the world. 

Favourite place to eat?

Paul: Thailimeleaves.

Favourite place for coffee?

Jane: Can’t Dance Coffee in The Sovereign.

Favourite pub?

Paul: Fork ‘n Ale

Jane: I do love Fork ‘n’ Ale, but I also love the Black Cat up by Grove Park and I’m really looking forward to Fat Head (opening 15 September 2023)  – our own brewery in the middle of Grove Village. 

They’re not only brewing onsite, but they are stocking spirits and wine from local businesses. So everything in their businesses is locally-produced and supplied. 

What is your favourite shop in Weston? 

Paul: Other than Outdoors & Active, Christopher’s Chocolates – who doesn’t love handmade amazing chocolates?

Jane: My go-to is Walker & Ling on the high street.