Stage 13: 3 miles in about 1.5 hours on Saturday 14th August
Musselwick Sands is at the southern extremity of the wide bay called St Bride's, and across to the north I could see the hills close to St David's. I always think it's remarkable how the shape of this bay echoes the much bigger horseshoe of Cardigan Bay, which forms the coastline of mid-Wales.
The path today was not difficult at all (i.e. no massive ups / downs), the sun shone and out in the bay eight oil tankers were at anchor. I'm told that they make for this bay as a nice place to sit and wait for the oil price to rise. Once this has happened, then all they have to do is to turn around and enter the Milford Haven waterway to offload at one of the jetties.
Bob accompanied me on this stage of the path, and soon a discussion arose about the naming of a rocky outcrop we could see ahead. The map calls it Nab Head and my guidebook said this was a corruption of Knap, something to do with collecting flints in prehistoric times. Bob favoured Knob, a high bit of ground - and, having consulted the dictionary, I think he's right.
Along the way we met another traveller - this very large (not far off 3") caterpillar - as yet not identified. We also skirted yet another Huntsman's Leap, though without the legend attached to the one close to St Govan's Head (see Stage 6). We were quite glad to be horseless and therefore not obliged to attempt this one.
Much of our route ran to one side of a substantial wall, which is the estate wall for St Bride's Castle and we followed this all the way down to St Bride's Haven.
This is a magical little bay, which looks nothing at high tide but, when the tide is out, the beach is made up of rocks, sand and pools - what proper seaside should be in my view. In the background can be seen yet another set of 'Stack Rocks'.
Close to the beach is a large, well restored lime kiln, where lime brought by boat was burned to be used in agriculture and for painting buildings. We also wandered into the church, which was simply beautiful - certainly dating from the 13th Century.
This is a magical little bay, which looks nothing at high tide but, when the tide is out, the beach is made up of rocks, sand and pools - what proper seaside should be in my view. In the background can be seen yet another set of 'Stack Rocks'.
Close to the beach is a large, well restored lime kiln, where lime brought by boat was burned to be used in agriculture and for painting buildings. We also wandered into the church, which was simply beautiful - certainly dating from the 13th Century.
Total walked: 89 out of 186
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