A network of routes from the picturesque, hillside village of St Dogmaels to around the peninsula of Cemaes Head offers a variety of circular routes and spectacular coastal scenery.
The highest sea cliffs in the Park are between Cemaes Head and Pen-yr-Afr, where you'll see dramatic folding and contorting of the rocks (the effects of powerful earth movements orogenies over millions of years), which reveal the structure and strata of the earths crust. This walk is ideal for seeing sea-birds, particularly gulls such as the greater black-backed gull. Fulmars, cormorants, and guillemots nest on the cliffs through spring and early summer. Keep an eye out for chough (rare crows with vivid red beaks and legs that perform spectacular aerobatics), ravens, kestrels, buzzards, stonechats and the ubiquitous jackdaw.
The recent reintroduction of coastal grazing by ponies has improved the quality of cliff-top heath and grassland habitat for chough at Pwynt-y-Bar. Thrift and spring squill are prevalent on the slopes to the west and heather, bell heather, bracken and gorse cover the heath. Out in the bay bottlenose dolphins can sometimes be seen and seals breed on the beach from August to October. There are spectacular views over Cardigan Bay you may even see Snowdonia on a clear day.
Text provided by the BBC South West Wales Where I Live website



