Walking Festival April 27 - May 5 2019

The Dawlish Walking Festival 2019 is over and 720 walkers took part in the 38 walks on offer. Dawlish Transition took over the organisation of the Dawlish Walking Festival in 2018. The festival had been run successfully by Sustrans in 2016 and 2017. The 2018 Walking Festival ran over 10 days and had 668 walkers taking part. In 2017 there were 650 walkers, the festival was held over 11 days which included a Bank Holiday weekend.
This year we asked walkers if they were from outside the area and were pleased to find people had come from outside the area. We had walkers from Sheffield and Cheltenham who had booked accommodation to take part in the Festival. People had booked long weekends, short breaks or day trips and had come from Plymouth, Christow, Bristol, Exmouth and other parts of Devon.
We have received a lot of positive feedback both on social media and in person, with many compliments on the quality of the leaders and the variety of walks. This success is down to the hard work of the leaders and volunteers like yourself who have given their time in preparing and leading the walks.


This year’s festival has been supported by the Teignmouth firm of solicitors Scott Richards (www.scottrichards.co.uk) and Dawlish Town Council, and is organised by Dawlish Transition (www.dawlishtransition.org.uk). It also involves many local community groups such as Teignmouth and Dawlish Ramblers, Walk this Way, Dawlish Local History Group and the Dawlish and Teignmouth Camera Club to name a few. The festival kicked off with Scott Richards Coastal Path walk on Saturday 27th April.

The week’s highlights included: foraging walks, history walks, railway walks alongside popular favourites such as ‘Walking the Bounds’, meditation walks, and walk and draw. Two new walks already attracting interest this year are night walks: one at Dawlish Countryside Park and the other at Mamhead.
In addition for the first time there is a Singalong A Walk with local community choir Dawlish Rocks which is bound to be different! Another walk showcases artisits and designers in the town, while another offers the opportunity for a cream team and stroll in the fantastic gardens of RCH Bridge House.
A walk at Powderham Castle included areas not normally seen by the public. Many of the walks were free with just a few involving a small contribution or pre-booking where numbers are limited.
We also ran a special walking quiz for the under 10s too.

Dawlish Walking Festival 2019 Program PDF version can be downloaded here or picked up from local outlets including the Dawlish Tourist Information Centre and Library.


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Tel: 07999 218216 for more details