I do like to be beside the seaside

It was perfect picture postcard seaside weather on Sunday, warm, sunny, just enough breeze to make it bearable...
Our walk, for walking was the purpose of the trip, started at Bigbury-on-Sea, just a few miles east of Plymouth, famous mostly for having an almost island, Burgh Island, accessible along a causeway of perfect picture postcard golden seaside sand. We briefly admired the island, the causeway and the people enjoying the beach from above in the (pricey) car park before turning our backs on all that and trekking uphill and inland, climbing high above the Avon but following its path for a while. At the top of the hill we looped westwards through the village of Ringmore and back to the coast at Toby's Point. A magnificent look-out point this, with Burgh Island to the left and views all the way to Wembury at the entrance to Plymouth Sound to the right. From there we walked down through Challaborough, a small town of holiday caravans with its own shops and a more or less private beach, and back up and over to Bigbury again. About four miles in total.
I was once more extremely impressed by the standard of waymarking of the paths we followed and slightly surprised at the absence of any other walkers on the inland part of our route. South Hams council do seem to keep their public footpaths in better repair than most. Part of our walk was SW Coast Path, but not all of it, by any means.
The two most interesting bits of wildlife, oddly enough, were both right at the end of the walk, on the very busy path between Challaborough and Bigbury. I heard a peregrine falcon, looked up, and saw a buzzard. Strange! Then I saw that the buzzard was being buzzed by a pair of peregrines, who were flying up above it and divebombing it, while the buzzard flapped slowly round in circles. This is not behaviour I've seen before. Then, moments later, my eye was caught by a couple of scabious flowers which were being visited by three red and black variable burnet moths each (and one had a bumble bee as well). There were plenty of other scabious flowers around, but only these two seemed to be of interest. I thought perhaps the flowers only produce nectar for part of their flowering cycle, like gorse does, but they have such a short season that it would surely be counter productive.
Anyway, there it was, lunchtime, high tide, and the only pub on Burgh Island. Out of reach? No, not at all. There is a sea tractor which plies its way from Island to shore (about 200 metres) at high tide for those who do not wish to get their feet wet (and have £2 to spare) but with neap tides and a gentle sea there was only a matter of ten metres of ankle deep water to cross at the Island end to get to the pub, so we walked and paddled it. The pub is famous, apparently, for being a favourite of Agatha Christie, but I was somewhat disappointed in it. They know they have to cater for summer visitors, but they don't want to and do it with extreme ill grace. Half the pub is out of bounds to visitors; in the other half strangers who have braved the tide are allowed to queue (out of the door) for an overpriced drink and a choice of overpriced tired baguettes and sit on the non reserved benches outside in full sun to consume them, while the shady outdoor tables are reserved for 'proper' customers, of which there were none.
The island is privately owned, so I suppose one should be grateful for being allowed to step on to it at all. There is a path up to the top and back and after lunch my companions wandered up there, but I didn't bother. And another disappointment - two of my friends were determined to try to sea tractor to go back, but the tide had gone out again and it had stopped running by the time we were ready to leave. I paddled all the way back along the eastern side of the causeway, just so that I can say I have actually been in the sea (up to my knees anyway) this year, and Ty swam.
So there it was, our day beside the proper seaside. Enjoyable, as long as one can avoid actually sitting on a beach!