Dog-friendly walks in Padstow

Five and a half level miles of dismantled railway along the Camel estuary, about two hours each way on a hard all-weather surface that stays walkable in the wettest week of the year. It starts beside the old station at the head of Padstow harbour; the harbourside pay-and-display car parks are the nearest and fill by mid-morning from Whitsun onwards, and Wadebridge has its own car park at the far end if you prefer to walk it inland to sea. There are no stiles, no livestock and no cliff edge, but this is a shared cycleway carrying fast bikes in both directions, so a short lead is the sensible default; the estuary itself is fenced off from the trail for most of the way.

A three-mile loop out of Padstow along the estuary shore to two sandy coves and back over the fields, an easy hour and a half with one short pull up from the beach. It leaves from the harbour and the war memorial, so any of the Padstow car parks work; the walk is also the obvious use of a bad-weather day when the coast beyond Stepper Point is unwalkable. Only one stile, beside a gate, and no livestock as a rule; dogs may use Harbour Cove all year and there is a stream running onto the sand for a drink, but St George’s Cove is inside the council summer restriction and the coast path above it is unfenced.

Seven and a half miles round the whole of the Stepper Point headland, about three and a quarter hours with 150 metres of climbing spread over a series of short sharp pulls between coves. Start at the Trevone Bay car park, which is small and beach-facing and gone by ten on a fine day; the alternative is to park in Padstow and pick the walk up halfway. A couple of slate stiles will need a hand for a small or elderly dog, there are free-range cattle on the clifftop near Butter Hole, and the path runs unfenced along the top of some genuinely serious drops between Gunver Head and Stepper.