Heritage Coast

By Ben Perkins

Click here to view map

To welcome the spring, here is a classic walk in the downland of the so-called Heritage Coast, the area between Seaford and Eastbourne, which offers some of the best walking in the county.

It is a varied circuit, fairly up and down but without any severe gradients, starting and finishing at Exceat where there is a Visitor Centre and tea rooms. After visiting the peaceful village of Westdean, tucked down in a secluded valley surrounded by trees, the walk climbs steadily through the 2,000-acre Friston Forest, a predominantly beech woodland planted in 1926 to protect the water catchment area for the Eastbourne Water Company.

Continuing through mixed gorse, scrub and rough pasture within the Lullington Heath National Nature Reserve, another well-graded climb takes you up onto high ground with superb views.

After a descent to Litlington, where there is a choice of a pub or tea rooms, the return leg of the walk follows the Cuckmere River bank back to the start. Although much of this popular route will be familiar to regular walkers, the pleasant slanting path down into Charleston Bottom beyond point 3 was new to me and features in an Argus walk for the first time.

The whole walk uses clear and generally well-signed paths – in sharp contrast to some of our recent forays into the East Sussex Weald.

1. Start the walk along a path which leaves the A259 coast road next to the road entrance to the Exceat Visitor Centre, signed as the South Downs Way to Alfriston. Pass to the right of a flint building housing a bike hire establishment, go through a swing gate and follow a worn unfenced strip up a grassy hillside.

At the top, pause to look back towards the sea over the meanders of the Cuckmere River. Go through a gate, over steps in a flint wall and along a woodland path which soon descends a flight of wide steps.

At the bottom of the hill, join a lane on a corner and go straight ahead, shortly following the lane round to the right past the 14th century church and the even older parsonage.

2. At a T-junction, turn left along the access road into Friston Forest. Just past a house on your right, ignore a left fork, continuing along the main track, signed as a bridleway to Jevington and Friston.

A few yards past a pole barrier, where the path divides, keep left, signed to Jevington. Use the gradually rising path through the forest which joins a hard-surfaced road for a while before continuing within a wide forest ride.

3. Leave the wooded area through a gate and immediately turn left along a grassy path, walking parallel to the wood edge. After about 60 yards, where the more obvious path goes ahead, fork right along a narrower path which drops obliquely down a grassy slope into Charleston Bottom.

In the bottom corner, re-enter woodland through a gate and follow a wide path along the valley floor. Ignore the first oblique crossing path. At a complicated junction of paths, bear right for a few yards, then left through a bridle gate to continue along the valley floor, ignoring side paths.

4. After about half a mile, go through a gate where a notice indicates that you are entering Lullington Heath National Nature Reserve – a rare area of chalk heath where plants which flourish in acid soil can co-exist in close proximity to those which need the alkaline chalk.

Follow the main path ahead through the reserve. It is mainly scrub but has patches of rough pasture grazed at different times by various animals including ponies, sheep and goats. After about half a mile go through a gate and turn sharply back to the left along a fenced track which climbs steadily.

5. Where the track levels out, a short detour to the right brings you to Winchester’s Pond, a restored 19th century dewpond. From this point, the highest on the walk, go straight ahead. The clear chalk and flint track begins to drop down with a widening view across Alfriston and the Cuckmere valley, set against a backdrop of the Downs rising to the prominent summit of Firle Beacon.

After about a quarter of a mile, go ahead, signed to Litlington, ignoring a right fork. Ahead across the valley on the upper slopes of High and Over, you can pick out the shape of a carved horse. This is not an ancient hill figure but a relatively modern artefact.

Towards the bottom of the hill, follow the track as it bends left and then right to join a lane at Litlington. Turn left beside the road, passing Litlington Church on your right and tea rooms (seasonal) on your left.

Just short of the Plough and Harrow pub, turn right along a narrow tarmac twitten, signposted as part of the South Downs Way, which takes you down to a footbridge over the Cuckmere River.

6. Don't cross the bridge. Instead, follow the raised river bank downstream with the water on your right. This is a pleasant tidal section of the river which you can follow for over two miles to Exceat Bridge.

There is also a public right of way along the opposite bank of the river but is liable to flooding during high spring tides.

When I walked this section of the river in the autumn a solitary seal had been spotted as high upstream as Litlington, but this must be rare occurrence.

On reaching the A259, the Golden Galleon pub is a few yards to the right over the bridge. To complete the walk, cross the road and turn left along the raised bank alongside the road, across the valley and back to the Exceat Visitor Centre.