We left the car park and made our way back into the village of Ringmore. There were plenty of thatched cottages in the area and some had a thatched pheasant on top. I thought this might have been to scare other birds off. Aparently not, it is simply the 'signature' of the thatcher, his trade mark! We turned right and soon we were on the footpath linking Ringmore with the village of Bigbury.	We took the footpath down across fields and up a valley. The wind was certainly getting up as forecast. We stopped for morning coffee and then continued uphill along the footpath and 1.5 miles from the car park we were in Bigbury. This village is about 2 miles inland from its coastal namesake Bigbury on Sea. There was a certain amount of road walking at this stage as we made our way out of Bigbury, past the church and inland slightly towards the nearby village of Easton.
We managed to find another footpath which took us away from the traffic and after crossing one of many stiles we met on the walk, we found ourselves walking down a small road through Easton, a very small hamlet. Mitch and Tricia had indicated on the walks list that there were lots of stiles to be crossed on todays walk and for the first time that I can recall, there were no dogs on the walk, very, very unusual. The road through the hamlet continued steeply down until we came to the head of a small tributary of the Avon. We followed this inlet down on the right hand side and before long we were at the river Avon, about 1 mile downstream from Aveton Gifford.	A small road from Bigbury also leads down to this point as there is a tidal ford here, passable at low tide. As can be seen from the photograph it was the wrong state of the tide to cross it today. The posts mark the route of the tidal ford and once across, the road continues on up to Aveton Gifford itself. There were lots of birds in the river and it's worth noting that this section of the walk is maintained by the RSPB and the signs around indicate the range of birds you could expect to see during the year.
The area of the South Hams is renowned for the undulating terrain. We followed the river downstream for a very short distance and then took a footpath which climbed steeply up across a field. We began to really catch the South Westerly gale at this point and the first of the hats to go blew off and over into another field. The views from the high vantage point were excellent. The picture above shows the view upstream towards Aveton Gifford.	Having regained the high ground we had a section of relatively level walking, certainly compared with the earlier climb. The land fell away steeply towards the river at certain points as the picture below shows. We had wonderful river views in this section and stopped for lunch in a relatively sheltered spot. After lunch we continued across a couple of fields and approached a road again.
Luckily the RSPB had arranged a footpath through two fields parallel to the road so we managed to avoid the traffic. Leaving the fields we passed a barn and made our way down a narrow track almost right down to the river and then quite a stiff climb up again. After a fairly long and steep ascent passing yet another barn renovation en route, we emerged at the top of the hill by the side of Bigbury Golf course. We skirted the golf course for a while and then followed the right of way across the corner of the course. The wind was really howling by now and I reckoned it must have been 40kts or more.	Across another field and we were at the signpost indicating the start of Bigbury on Sea. We had left the Avon and the stormy sea below was looking very rough. We had good views of Burgh Island and the hotel, sheltered as it is from south west gale facing the seaside resort of Bigbury.
There were wind surfers screaming across the water just offshore and even today the beach looked very attractive, at least it did from our location. We didn't go down to the beach but followed a footpath through a field with bullocks and they certainly were not too happy to share the field with ramblers. We made our way down through the bungalows of Bigbury on Sea. How different it is in the winter when it is deserted, compared with the throngs of visitors it gets in the summer on sunny days.	We approached Challaborough Bay and the sea and beach looked quite spectacular, even in the gale we were now meeting head on. We grabbed a coffee down by the beach and a civilised toilet stop!! The wind was really blowing the and up from the beach at this point and many got sand in their eyes. Well I did, at least.
We made our way up the cliff path and as we did so, we were exposed to the full force of the gale. At least two more hats were blown off and over the fence into the field, lucky that the wind was coming in from the sea and not in the other direction. The clouds were definitely very threatening by now and the pictures show just how angry the seas were. We supported each other as we were buffeted making our way up the cliff path. It was quite frightening at times. Those of a lighter disposition certainly found it difficult to stop themselves being blown into the barbed wire fence.	This picture below shows the sea and coast looking west as we climbed out of Challaborough up the Aylmer Cliff managed by the National Trust, no sign of the sun now and it was surely only a matter of time before the rains came. At the top, we swung inland along a flat footpath and a few hundred yards later we were back at the car park at Ringmore, just before 3PM.

We had managed the whole walk with plenty of wind but no rain.

Thanks to both Tricia and Mitch for finding this excellent walk for us, yet another section of Devon many of us had not walked before.

We were soon on our way again driving back to Plymouth and the car share point at Elburton.

This walk had much to commend it with the variety of terrain, both inland, along the river Avon and finally a short section of the South West Coastal path for good measure.