Last weekend I took a trip with my favourite photographer, Rich – you might remember him from my Beaulieu and Brockenhurst post! If you’re new to my blog (hello!), Rich is my housemate from University and we still keep in touch to go on photography trips!
As he’s getting into landscape photography, Rich fancied a visit to Lulworth Cove and Durdledoor. Located in my hometown of Dorset, it’s a spectacular walk across the Jurassic Coast, featuring the geological wonder that is a giant rock arch (I don’t think I’ve really sold this). When Rich was researching the place, he saw these amazing pictures of the sunset over the rocks, and decided he was going to get in on the action.
I was more than happy to join in – partly because Rich possesses the rare talent of making me look at least half-decent in pictures, and he can usually be persuaded to snap a few blog photos for me. Thanks Rich!
Rich and I
But before I get into the walk itself, here are a few background details to really set the scene:
Rich likes being outdoors, whereas I’m a rather sedentary, indoor sort of gal.
Rich has become a right ole gym bunny recently. I have the muscle definition of a newborn baby and the beer belly of Homer Simpson.
Rich’s motto is: ‘I’d climb a mountain to get a good picture’. Mine is: ‘can I watch Netflix yet?’
Can you guess where this is going? Yep, I found the walk just a little bit tough. You know, the sort of throw-yourself-on-the-floor-don’t-make-me-walk-anymore tough.
In my defence, it wasn’t completely due to my laziness. For the previous two days, I’d accidentally done exercise. The horror. It started with a 10,000 step beach walk to brunch with my friend (and I was hungry), and ended with the completion of the Charlotte Crosby Belly Blitz workout. Ironically, my abs felt fine, but my arms felt like lead – there’s a lot of punching involved.
Worth it
So, after a delicious lunch at The Weld, and with my heavy limbs just about intact, Rich and I started our trek up Durdle Door. I live in Dorset, but I’d forgotten that Durdle Door starts with this ridiculously large, steep hill. With a 33% gradient. I got about halfway up before I realised ‘bollocks, this is hard work’.
But once we reached the top, I knew the inevitable aching would be worth it. Even though the weather was cloudy, chilly, incredibly blustery and had threatened to rain, the sea was bright turquoise and the sun had started to shine. Forget dull British coastline, this looked like the Mediterranean!
After we’d taken a few snaps from the top, there was a mile or so of hills and some killer steps to tackle before we reached Durdle Door beach. It’s so photogenic that several films and music videos have been filmed around here – I tried not to get too excited about treading the same paths as Emma Thompson and Stephen Fry.
Lulworth Cove
Then it was back up the killer steps (hello spaghetti legs!), down the big hill and through the town to Lulworth Cove. After all that walking, I basically felt like Lara Croft. Complete with injuries – naturally I’d already fallen over once.
And that’s when I realised we needed to walk over the top of Lulworth Cove to get photos of the sunset. Another couple of hours of walking!? Up a big cliff!? My burger-fuelled body wan’t equipped for this. So after a small beach-based tantrum, which you can watch in my video below, I waved goodbye to Rich as he walked up a vertical cliff path marked ‘unstable’, and I returned to the town to find a pub. Where there was no signal. And my phone ran out of charge. But that’s a different story.
Watch our adventure
Join Rich and I on our walk! Grab a cuppa, watch out for Rich getting hit in the face and the moment I turn into Richard Ayoade, and enjoy the beautiful views!
All photos of me in this post are courtesy of Rich Fletcher. Thanks Rich!
Such beautiful photos! It is so easy to forget how many beautiful places there are in England x
http://www.bisoushollyolivia.co.uk
Thanks Holly! 🙂
I always forget too – I need to get out and visit more places! 🙂
xx