When I was a little girl I read a book called Ingo, by Helen Dunmore. The book is set in Cornwall, England and is about a girl called Sapphire who discovers she has the ability to become Mer when she slips beneath the surface of the ocean. The story follows Sapphire on a number of adventures through the ocean around Cornwall and it absolutely cast a spell on me. Since reading Ingo for the first time when I was about 10 years old I have yearned to dive in Cornwall. Fast forward to 2022 and my dream came true!

At the time my boyfriend and I were living on different continents, him just outside of London, and me in Cape Town. While we were apart we planned an epic trip across the South-West coast of England. We planned and we prepped and we dreamed and then the time came for me to catch my flight and I was there! We rented a car and started our journey from London to Cornwall. This was in July of 2022, a UK summer that broke heatwave records. Our car’s air conditioning was on the blink so we sweated the whole way there, but we were spurred on by the prospect of diving in new waters! 

Along the way we stopped for two nights in Lyme Regis on the Jurassic Coast. What a place! We spent three days walking the shoreline finding clam fossils, fossilised echinoderms, and even an ammonite! We also got our first taste of diving in the UK. And it was amazing! To us the water felt warm at 18 degrees (especially me coming from Cape Town Winter where the water was hovering around 14 degrees) and there was so much to see! So much wonderful algae, beautiful sand eels, and the most electric snakelocks anemones. I got a bit too close to a snakelocks anemone and have the scar to prove it to this day.

Next stop was St Keverne in Cornwall. This was the longest stay of our trip (7 days), we wanted to get a chance to get to know the place as much as possible in a short time. We stopped in at Porthkerris Divers to rent weight belts and tap into some local knowledge around dive sites and what to look out for. And then we began our Cornish adventures! We found a path leading down to a small beach with some lovely rocky structures jutting out from the sea and we jumped in! To our delight we discovered that the little unassuming beach was an underwater paradise. So many fish, an abundance of algae diversity and the most beautiful jellyfish. We had found our “home reef” for the trip. A base for us to return to if we couldn’t find other places to dive. We soon realised this wouldn’t be a problem though…

While we definitely maximised on being so close to such a wonderful dive site, we also explored a bit further afield. We took a day trip to Falmouth and dived at Swanpool Beach. A picturesque site that covers huge swathes of the most beautiful geology. We took a couple of trips to Coverack, another tiny town with little to no information about diving or freediving and were delighted to find that it was an untapped GEM! We coincided with spider crab moulting season and swam over carpets of spider crabs as they shed their old shells. Being a harbour town, there are loads of boats moored in the bay and the sounds of their anchor chains swaying in the current sounded like tiny bells tinkling. All in all, Coverack was a truly unforgettable place to dive. 

After 7 days of intensive exploring and diving, we packed our bags for the last leg of our trip. St Keverne, to Lulworth Cove, where we spent 2 nights in a tiny attic room AirBnB. From Lulworth we packed our dive gear and walked over the hill to Durdle Door. Seeing Durdle Door in person was breathtaking! It really is a natural wonder and we were so excited to dive through the door. So we did just that, we geared up and went for a dive through the door and around the headland. This felt like a really special way to end an unforgettable trip.

I got to finally experience the waters that had so enchanted me growing up. This trip really was such a joy, every step along the way unlocked a new exciting adventure. If you are looking to road trip from London to Cornwall, this route comes highly recommended!

Here is the route we took:

London to Lyme Regis (~4 hours)

Lyme Regis to St Keverne (~3 hours)

Day trip to Falmouth (~40 minutes)

Day trip to Coverack (under 10 minutes)

St Keverne to Lulworth Cove (~4 hours)

Lulworth Cove to London (~3 hours)