Create your own portfolio of stunning Instagrammable images at these picture-perfect UK locations
By Dixe Wills
1 Kynance Cove, Cornwall Spectacular sea stacks
If you haven’t been to Kynance Cove but think you recognise it, it could be that you’re a fan of classic television drama. The bay on the western side of the Lizard Peninsula has served as Nampara in the more recent Poldark series, and appeared in popular televised productions of The Return of Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None.
It’s no surprise that directors have been lured here. Kynance Cove’s dramatic jumble of stacks and miniature islands – some topped with emerald-green grass – look as though an angry giant has run amok on the coastline. Add in a cloth of stunning white sand and a rolling sea and you’ve got yourself a scene that will look spectacular no matter what angle you frame it.
At low tide, you can clamber around the stacks and explore mysterious caves with quaint names, such as The Drawing Room and The Ladies Bathing Pool. Just remember, if you venture around the cove, don’t get caught out by the swiftness of the incoming tide (there are no lifeguards).
A few miles along the coast is Britain’s most southerly tip. A dramatic finger of land poking out from Lizard Point with a cluster of buildings clinging to its slender ridge, it has made many a photographer happy.
Also nearby: Lizard Point Lighthouse (trinityhouse.co.uk) is crammed with interactive displays and interesting historical knick-knacks.
Useful info
• Opening hours: dawn to dusk.
• nationaltrust.org.uk
2 Puzzlewood, Gloucestershire Go off-world
Over millions of years, in a process that is possibly unique to the Forest of Dean, limestone and sandstone caverns rich with iron ore were pushed to the Earth’s surface and exposed to the rain and wind. The Romans then came along and confused the landscape further by digging out the iron ore. The result is Puzzlewood, 5.6 hectares of curious rock formations and caves under a blanket of ancient woodland and copious carpets of moss.
It’s a wonderfully ethereal and atmospheric place inhabited by badgers, deer, foxes, owls and buzzards. It has also provided an otherworldly backdrop to scenes in Doctor Who, Star Wars, Merlin and numerous other films and TV dramas. You can explore it on a mile-and-a-half of narrow labyrinthine paths created in the 19th century.
There are more than 200 steps that can become slippery in the rain so come appropriately shod. Also, the use of drones and tripods is not allowed.
Also nearby: Clearwell Caves (clearwellcaves.co
