Cogden Beach
A wilder stretch of Chesil shingle east of Burton Bradstock, reached by a field walk from the National Trust car park, with the Fleet reedbeds behind. Dorset Council lists it as open to dogs all year round. No cafe, no lifeguard, and much emptier than Hive Beach as a result.
Hive Beach
Steep golden shingle at the western end of Chesil, with the most dramatic cliffs on the west Dorset coast behind it. Dorset Council records no formal restriction here, but the National Trust, which owns it, asks that dogs are not exercised on the beach between 1 May and 30 September. Cogden Beach a mile east is open all year.
Hive Beach to Cogden and back over the fields
A 4.2-mile two-hour loop east along the low sandstone cliffs to Cogden Beach, then inland on farm tracks and back through the thatched middle of Burton Bradstock. Flat by Dorset standards, 90 metres of climb, and the cliff path is grass over crumbling rock with no fence. Start at the National Trust Hive Beach car park, pay and display and free to members, which takes about 150 cars and empties onto a single lane, so aim to arrive before ten in August. The clifftop and Cogden fields are open all year with cattle in places, and while there is a dog water bowl outside the Hive Beach Café the beach itself falls under the Dorset Council seasonal order, signed at the slipway.