Rame Head

Top choice in South Cornwall

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A great bulk of rock topped by a picturesque clifftop chapel, Rame Head is another of Cornwall's most majestic coastal viewpoints, with a jaw-dropping 360-degree panorama stretching east towards Plymouth Sound and the South Hams, and west to Dodman Point, the Roseland and even the Lizard on a really clear day. It was occupied by an Iron Age hillfort and an early Christian oratory, but the present chapel was built in the late-14th century, dedicated to St Michael.

Generations of sailors and seafarers have used this rocky headland and its chapel as a waymarker; it's traditionally one of the last sights of England as they chart a course south, and the first sight when they return. It even features in an old sea shanty, Spanish Ladies: 'Now the first land we made it is called the Deadman, Next Ram Head off Plymouth, off Portland the Wight…'

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