The Royal Naval College is bathed in sunlight as we arrive in Dartmouth, the port from which Crusaders set sail in 1190, to reclaim the Holy Land.

My own mission is less elevated and certainly more enjoyable. As a feeble-footed walker with a scrambled sense of direction, I am to be passed, like a baton in a relay race, from friend to concerned friend on a four-day walk along a modest 30-mile section of the South West Coast Path. It will take me from Dartmouth to Hope Cove, sampling Devon’s fresh-and-local culinary scene along the way.

The path, all 630 miles, is the longest trail in England and celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Our chosen stretch is rich in motivation: the prospect of all that fish, crab and lobster, and the abundance of boutique dairies, wineries and distilleries garnering awards in this part of the world.

Sailing boats bob in the sparkling estuary, as Friend No 1 and I make for a waterfront watering hole, Embankment, to toast the start of our trip. This curious building was a railway station until 1972. It is, possibly, the only station in the world where you needed to cross a river to reach the train.

Our 14th Century lodgings, Bayards Cove Inn, offers an excellent dinner of smoked haddock fishcakes. Through these leaded windows 400 years ago, I might have watched the Pilgrims board the Mayflower at the cobbled quayside a few steps away.

Armed with an Ordnance Survey we set off next morning, first reaching 12th Century St Petrox Church, whose graveyard has views over the Dart Estuary.

It’s an easy walk along country lanes, flanked by drystone walls speckled with lichens. We descend to Blackpool Sands in time for lunch: cod and chips on a pristine Blue Flag beach. Families shelter behind stripy, 1950s-style wind-breaks – the scene is pure Beryl Cook.

Fortified, we continue through emerald velvet fields of unshorn sheep to Slapton Sands, where rehearsals took place for the D-Day Landings. The shingle is hard going but the sea air is invigorating.

At Torcross, a decision has to be made: do we take a short cut via the coast and risk being stranded by the tide or attempt the longer, forest route over the cliffs? No 1 advises caution and, by the time we reach The Cricket Inn at the fishing village of Beesands, parched, the only sensible antidote is a large Salcombe gin on the sea wall.

Dinner is a feast of fat whitebait, scallops and sea bream. I sleep well, the beam from distant Start Point lighthouse winking away.

The next morning, after breakfast (kippers), Friend No 2 and I make for the ghost village of Hallsands, which collapsed into the sea and is now inhabited by kittiwakes.

Rounding the point where seals bask on rocks, we persevere to East Prawle. This stretch to Gara Rock is dramatic and terrifying. The path narrows to 8 inches along cliffs carpeted in foxgloves, bluebells, vetch and acres of red campion.

No 2, it turns out, has got the short straw. She has to coax me over rocks as I try not to look down, fearing a plunge into those turquoise waters. To judge by memorial stones we pass, not everyone survived this rugged beauty.

I’m longing for concrete under foot. With huge relief we limp into Salcombe, that yachtie haven, and make for the Harbour Hotel. Never has a dinner of local cheese souffle and hake with crab herb crust, accompanied by a crisp Sharpham wine, been so well-deserved, – nor a bed seemed more inviting.

Thankfully, our schedule here is more a digestive than physical work-out, starting with the Salcombe Dairy chocolate factory, where Peruvian beans are hand-crafted into dark delights. Next door, I visit the Salcombe Distillery for a rum-making class, where we select spices and fruits to distil our own creation.

Then it is a short skip to Fish Quay for lunch at the wonderful, rough-and-ready Crab Shed.

It is when we are almost blown off a cliff near Bolt Head (tip: do not wear loose clothing) that Friend No 3 and I decide to cheat and taxi two miles to my last hotel, Soar Mill Cove. The afternoon is spent ambling down to the beach, where tired feet are cooled in crystal waters.

The final day dawns for our last leg: over grassy headlands to the fishing village of Hope Cove. We perch outside at the Lobster Pod for lunch of perfect simplicity: calamari, scallops and, of course, lobster – locally caught and fresh as can be. We clink celebratory glasses and agree: there’s nothing like good food as incentive for a healthy walk.

The scale of profits at HSBC, the UK’s largest bank, was certain to attract unwanted attention.

Earnings of £17billion look to be off the scale at a time when High Street banks rightly are in the dock over poor returns for savers, branch closures and rotten customer service.

All of that is true, but HSBC is much more complex than Britain’s other banks, with the possible exception of Barclays.

Britain is only a fraction of what it does. Nevertheless, there is reason to applaud its decision to take on Silicon Valley Bank in the UK at a time when the drive into tech, AI and the life sciences is so critical for the nation. HSBC also fits well into the post-Brexit agenda of reaching out to Asia-Pacific regions.

When Kemi Badenoch signed up to the impossibly named Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership last month, it received a lukewarm welcome on grounds that the extra output would be negligible. 

But what should not be forgotten is that in HSBC and Standard Chartered, the UK has a reach into Asia like no other European banks.

HSBC does tread a perilous path when it comes to Hong Kong-Chinese relations. Kowtowing to Beijing has not won it political friends. 

But given its huge role in the region in trade finance and as a provider of banking services to other commercial banks, realpolitik has been necessary.

Work done by chief executive Noel Quinn to narrow HSBC’s footprint globally, scythe costs and improve margins is paying off. 

The sale of North America is completed. France has been sold and a Canada deal is due to be finalised next year.

All of this enables improving returns, a second dividend and a second buyback this year of £1.6billion. 

That is extremely useful in keeping its army of Hong Kong private investors happy. It also de-fangs the effort by mainland China shareholder Ping An – with an 8 per cent stake – to force a break-up. 

In banking you never quite know where the next shock is coming from, and there were concerns that Hong Kong and Chinese real estate could be a banana skin.

So far, so good.

Raising spirits

The late Sir Ivan Menezes used to compare Diageo with a start-up seeking to conquer the world.

The Guinness-to-Johnnie Walker group may only have less than 5 per cent of the global booze market, but with its upmarket brands and innovation it has become one of the UK’s more impressive exporters.

Menezes’ Texas-born successor Debra Crew is as enthusiastic about premium brand building and conquering new markets as he was. 

Johnnie Walker remains the core whisky brand and the newer spin-offs, such as Blonde in Latin America and Gold look to be doing as well as established label Black and super-pricey Blue.

Investment is going into re-opening so-called ghost distilleries in Scotland, seen by Crew as a significant investment in the long future. 

The group’s move into tequilas remains an enormous growth category in the US, Mexico and across the globe.

Overall group sales volumes slipped in 2022-23, but the increasing importance of upmarket brands, now 63 per cent of sales, meant improved margins and profits, which climbed to a whopping £4.6billion at the operating level.

Crew is as keen on discovering fresh luxury brands as her predecessor and also views India as a great opportunity.

There is a whinge about the rise in duties in the UK with 70 per cent of a bottle of Scotch now tax. But one has to believe in the rarefied luxury world, to which Diageo aspires, it is not going to make a ferocious dent.

Guinness remains core. A £73million investment in Guinness at Old Brewer’s Yard at Covent Garden is proof. Sláinte.

Green light

After the bonanza came a 70 per cent slump in BP profits in the second quarter, disappointing the market.

In spite of his green push, chief executive Bernard Looney recognises that oil and gas are still critical and has slowed the energy giant’s escape from hydro-carbons to a 25 per cent cut from 2019 daily production levels by 2030. 

It has retreated from the original 40 per cent pledge. That won’t endear BP to the carbon zero zealots. 

The critics ought to be comforted by its big investments in offshore wind in Germany and UK biofuels, electric vehicle charging and hydrogen making it one of country’s larger climate change investors.

Just Stop Oil won’t be satisfied until the lights go out.