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[cut] he and Dumbledore were standing in a bustling, old-fashioned London street. [cut] [cut] they followed [Dumbledore’s] younger self a short distance, finally passing through a set of iron gates into a bare courtyard that fronted a rather grim, square building surrounded by high railings. He mounted the few steps leading to the front door and knocked once. [cut] 'Good afternoon. I have an appointment with a Mrs Cole who, I believe, is the matron here?' [HBP ch. #13; p. 246/247]
[cut] 'on the summer outing – we take them out, you know, once a year, to the countryside or to the seaside – well, Amy Benson and Dennis Bishop were never quite right afterwards, and all we ever got out of them was that they’d gone into a cave with Tom Riddle. He swore they'd just gone exploring, but something happened in there, I’m sure of it.' [HBP ch. #13; p. 251]
As regards the cave where the locket was hidden, Kreacher’s tale tells us nothing, because he sees only the inside of the cave. It could be anywhere in the world, but we know it’s in mainland Britain because children from a London orphanage went there for a summer treat in the 1930s, at a time when even a trip to France would have been a major undertaking.
Much depends on whether the orphanage’s trip to the coast was a day-trip or a proper holiday, which is not made clear. If they were going to stay for some days or weeks then they might travel a considerable distance, perhaps as far as the Lake District or Wales: but if they were only going for the day they’re unlikely to have gone to anywhere more than two hours’ journey from London, otherwise the journey would eat up too much of the day. Even allowing for the fact that trains at that time were pretty fast, they would still have to get everybody assembled and down to the train station, so a day-trip would limit them to a circle of a radius of probably not much over a hundred miles from London.
I did manage to find a .pdf facsimile of the 1924-25 annual report of Henry Toye's Home for Orphan and Fatherless Girls in Lewisham, South London. These girls (who remained at the orphanage until age sixteen or seventeen) had a summer holiday "to set them up for the winter", paid for by various donations. It wasn't clear whether they had a holiday every single year, but the previous year the girls had been away for "11 or 12 days each" (a phrasing which suggests they did so in shifts), and that year they had "a fortnight each at Fishbourne, near Chichester, which is only an omnibus ride from Bognor, Selsey, Littlehampton etc." So it's certainly possible that Tom and his fellow orphans went away for a couple of weeks, in which case they could have travelled far afield; on the other hand Mrs Cole's reference to a "summer outing" does sound more like a day trip.
Once back under the starry sky, Harry heaved Dumbledore on to the top of the nearest boulder and then to his feet [HBP ch. #27; p. 541]
What do we know about the physical location? The sky is strewn with stars – so it's not near a city or a large town. There is a high cliff which is more or less vertical, and (in Dumbledore's opinion, at any rate) incapable of being scaled by an amateur except with special assistance. The cliff appears to be crumbling – boulders have fallen from it.
Standing in the sea near the cliff is a separate, high outcrop of rock, which can be ascended or descended by means of a series of jagged niches which provide hand- and footholds. There are boulders between this outcrop and the cliff, and we are told that the area is too dangerous for boats to approach the cliff – presumably because of these boulders.
These boulders are described as "half-submerged". We know it's not high tide and we know the water-level is at least some feet below what it would be at high tide, because Harry and Dumbledore are able to swim through a tunnel which would be completely filled with water at high tide. Even so, there is a stretch of open water between the last of these boulders and the cliff, and that water is deep enough to swim in even at fairly low tide, so at least four foot deep (shallower than that and they would presumably just have waded across). It's possible that there's a deep channel between the boulders and the cliff but assuming the sea-floor the boulders stand on is about level with the sea-floor between them and the cliff, the boulders are "half-submerged" in water at least four foot deep so they are at least around eight foot tall, yet close enough together to be used as stepping-stones.
There are no trees visible, and no "sweep" of grass or sand. That is, there might possibly be a few tussocks of grass, or a few corners of rock with a little sand in them, but nothing like an obviously grassy slope or a proper sandy beach. That doesn't necessarily rule out a shingle beach, provided it was rough enough not to interfere with the barren impression, but it does sound more as if the cliff goes straight down into the water. The fact that Dumbledore thinks the orphans were probably taken to a clifftop site for "a little sea air and a view of the waves", rather than down to the water, tends to confirm that this is not the sort of place that has much in the way of accessible beaches.
There is a narrow fissure in the base of the cliff which has water in it deep enough to swim in even at low tide, and which fills high enough to submerge the tunnel it leads to at high tide.
Dumbledore says there is "a village of sorts about halfway along the cliffs." He doesn't say halfway to what but the implication is that the cliffs come to some sort of end which they can probably see from where they are, and also that the village is either very small and perfunctory or it's got something odd and un-village-like about it – perhaps a handful of shops and a pub that exist to service a nearby RAF base, or something of that sort. This suggests that the area is fairly remote.
Strikingly, the cliff, the boulders and the stone inside the tunnel are all described as black, dark or tar-like.
At Workington in Cumbria there are jet-black cliffs protected from the sea by a fringe of boulders, but these cliffs are actually old, eroded coal slag-heaps, and it seems unlikely that they would travel over two hundred and fifty miles from London to Cumbria to visit a glorified coal-heap. In any case these coal-cliffs are not very high - they look about 15ft at most - and the cliff where the cave is sounds natural, with its sheer face and glimmeringly-walled tunnel. Cliffs beyond the harbour wall at Boscastle © Mike Wood at Geograph Hazel Bushes Bay near Ilfracombe © Pauline Eccles at Geograph Natural black cliffs in Britain are fairly rare and they all seem to be either in the far west – Devon, Cornwall, Wales, the Hebrides – or the far north i.e. Caithness or Shetland. We can probably rule out the Scottish ones on the grounds of distance: even if the orphans were going away for a whole fortnight, why would they travel between three hundred and five hundred miles to visit what sounds like a rather uncomfortable slice of seaside when they could have found many stretches of reasonable beach less than a hundred miles from London? Cliffs below the Lizard Point lighthouse © Jonathan Billinger at Geograph St Mary\'s Well near Aberdaron, from Turkinator at Flickr The St David\'s lifeboat standing off Porthclais © Jeremy Bolwell at Geograph Some of the cliffs in the Devon/Cornwall area can be ruled out because they are too sloping or too low, or they have too much greenery on them, or definite sandy beaches at the foot. There are reasonable candidates in the Boscastle area of Cornwall, and also some spectacular dark grey cliffs at Ilfracombe in north Devon: but if we're going to settle for the merely dark grey it would be better to go for the shale cliffs of Dorset (see below) which at least are near enough to London to justify a day trip. The best matches however – very black, very sheer, with rough water and boulders at the foot, and remote enough to have villages "of sorts" – are at the Lizard Peninsula in the far west of Cornwall (which might put Tom's cave close to Tinworth), the Lleyn Peninsula, especially St Mary's Well near Aberdaron, and the St David's/Porthclais area in Pembrokeshire. The last two are both in Wales. Sculpture at Mynydd Mawr Woodland Park, from Carmarthenshire official website Confusingly, the Lleyn Peninsula is sometimes referred to as the Mynydd Mawr area because there is a mountain of that name at the landward end of the peninsula, but there is also a second place called Mynydd Mawr which is about seventy miles south of the one on the Lleyn Peninsula, and about forty-five miles east of St David's. This second Mynydd Mawr is inland but it is noteworthy for a woodland park which contains a spectacular and very ritualistic-looking painted wood-and-tyre sculpture of a giant snake. I don't know how long it's been there, but you could easily interpret it as a memorial of some kind either to Riddle or to Regulus, making a hidden reference to the other Mynydd Mawr of the black cliffs. Natural black cliffs in England and Wales, adapted from Streetmap.co.uk However, St David's/Porthclais seems to have the best cliffs - high and steep and black with outlying black rocks just off the shore, and requiring special equipment in order to climb them. The nearest village, St David's, is rather large, but St David's is inland a bit, so Dumbledore's "village of sorts about halfway along the cliffs" might possibly have been the complex of caravan-park, cottages-to-let and organic cheese factory at Caerfai Farm - especially if it was already taking in tourists in some capacity in the 1930s. Nevertheless, the problem with these again is distance. Although they are somewhat nearer – and much more likely holiday destinations – than Workington, even Ilfracombe, the closest of them, is about 180 miles from London as the crow flies. Lizard Point, Aberdaron and St David's are respectively around 250, 225 and 240 miles from London, and Aberdaron especially is in a rather inaccessible position. Even allowing for fast steam trains with a speed of around 80mph (which as far as I've been able to ascertain seems to have been about the standard for long-distance trains at the time), it would probably take an hour to get the orphans organised, down to the station and onto the train, so there would be a journey-time of three to four hours each way. I suppose if they set off at 8am they could be in, say, St David's by noon and stay till about 5pm, but what would be the point of making such a very long journey in order to stay for only five hours? If Tom's cave is in any of these locations, then really the only sensible conclusion is that the orphanage must have taken the orphans there at least for a long weekend: but Mrs Cole's description of the trip as "an outing" and "tak[ing] them out" sounds more like a day trip. The cliffs of Kimmeridge, adapted from a map at the University of Southampton\'s pages on the geology of the Wessex coast Alternatively, about a hundred miles from London, in the area around Kimmeridge Bay on the Dorset coast, there are dark grey, fossil- and shale-rich cliffs which could pass for black in the evening light. Their position relative to London is marked on the map above, along with the positions of Porthclais, Boscastle etc.. They form part of the fossil-rich "Jurassic coast" World Heritage Site, which stretches all the way from Exmouth in Devon (near Ottery St Catchpole) to Studland in Dorset, just west of Poole. The accompanying chart of the main geological features of the area shows which stretches of cliff have the dark "Kimmeridge clay" at the surface, and which can be ruled out because they have sandy beaches at the foot. The best-known stretch of these grey cliffs is a beautiful near-circular cove called Chapman's Pool. The cave can't be in Chapman's Pool itself because there are beaches there, but many of the cliffs round the corner from Chapman's Pool do seem to go straight down into the water, at least when the tide isn't right out. View across Chapman\'s Pool to Houns-tout Cliff, from Visiting Purbeck The area is said to be dangerous (see Fossil Collecting in Dorset) because walkers there can easily be cut off by the tide, and although it's possible to climb down to the beach in Chapman's Pool the route down is very long. If the orphans' "outing" was indeed the day-trip it sounds like, then it's perfectly possible they were taken for a day's educational fossil-hunting in beautiful Chapman's Pool, and Tom wandered off around the coast to somewhere even more dangerous and inaccessible. We only have Dumbledore's View down to Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner of Clavell\'s Hard © Jim Champion at Geograph opinion that the orphans were meant to stay at the top of the cliff, and he is only speculating. It would be appealing to think that the sinister Horcrux-cave was sited in the stretch of cliff which is charmingly called Cuddle. The most likely site, however, is Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner formed by the promontory called Clavell's Hard. This has very dark rock, no beach except for a skirt of grey clay, old mine-workings and a cave leading in under the cliff: albeit a large, open one which seems to be above the water-line. You can see more views of the cliffs around Kimmeridge, including a detailed close-up of Blackstone Bay with geological notes, at the University of Southampton's site on Geology of the Wessex Coast of Southern England: Kimmeridge - The Blackstone - Oil Shale and at Explore the South West Coast Path: Lulworth - Chapman's Pool. Conclusion Porthclais in south-west Wales, near Haverford West, has the best cliffs, which answer the description perfectly - sheer, black, unclimbable without special equipment, with jagged black rocks standing out in the sea. The "village of sorts" where the orphans stayed would probably be the large Caerfai farm complex cum tourist campsite near the top of the cliffs. However, at about 240 miles from London it's probably too far away for a day trip: we would have to assume that the orphans' "outing" was for a weekend, or even for a week or two. On the other hand, if we want to stick to the orphans having gone there on a day-trip, then the Kimmeridge area in Dorset will do. It's not perfect - most of the cliffs there are definitely grey rather than black and it tends to have small rocks in the water rather than big boulders - but if you imagine it sexed up a little for story purposes it could fit the bill, and there are a number of very small villages and hamlets in the area which Dumbledore might be referring to.
Natural black cliffs in Britain are fairly rare and they all seem to be either in the far west – Devon, Cornwall, Wales, the Hebrides – or the far north i.e. Caithness or Shetland. We can probably rule out the Scottish ones on the grounds of distance: even if the orphans were going away for a whole fortnight, why would they travel between three hundred and five hundred miles to visit what sounds like a rather uncomfortable slice of seaside when they could have found many stretches of reasonable beach less than a hundred miles from London? Cliffs below the Lizard Point lighthouse © Jonathan Billinger at Geograph
Some of the cliffs in the Devon/Cornwall area can be ruled out because they are too sloping or too low, or they have too much greenery on them, or definite sandy beaches at the foot. There are reasonable candidates in the Boscastle area of Cornwall, and also some spectacular dark grey cliffs at Ilfracombe in north Devon: but if we're going to settle for the merely dark grey it would be better to go for the shale cliffs of Dorset (see below) which at least are near enough to London to justify a day trip.
The best matches however – very black, very sheer, with rough water and boulders at the foot, and remote enough to have villages "of sorts" – are at the Lizard Peninsula in the far west of Cornwall (which might put Tom's cave close to Tinworth), the Lleyn Peninsula, especially St Mary's Well near Aberdaron, and the St David's/Porthclais area in Pembrokeshire. The last two are both in Wales.
Confusingly, the Lleyn Peninsula is sometimes referred to as the Mynydd Mawr area because there is a mountain of that name at the landward end of the peninsula, but there is also a second place called Mynydd Mawr which is about seventy miles south of the one on the Lleyn Peninsula, and about forty-five miles east of St David's. This second Mynydd Mawr is inland but it is noteworthy for a woodland park which contains a spectacular and very ritualistic-looking painted wood-and-tyre sculpture of a giant snake. I don't know how long it's been there, but you could easily interpret it as a memorial of some kind either to Riddle or to Regulus, making a hidden reference to the other Mynydd Mawr of the black cliffs. Natural black cliffs in England and Wales, adapted from Streetmap.co.uk However, St David's/Porthclais seems to have the best cliffs - high and steep and black with outlying black rocks just off the shore, and requiring special equipment in order to climb them. The nearest village, St David's, is rather large, but St David's is inland a bit, so Dumbledore's "village of sorts about halfway along the cliffs" might possibly have been the complex of caravan-park, cottages-to-let and organic cheese factory at Caerfai Farm - especially if it was already taking in tourists in some capacity in the 1930s. Nevertheless, the problem with these again is distance. Although they are somewhat nearer – and much more likely holiday destinations – than Workington, even Ilfracombe, the closest of them, is about 180 miles from London as the crow flies. Lizard Point, Aberdaron and St David's are respectively around 250, 225 and 240 miles from London, and Aberdaron especially is in a rather inaccessible position. Even allowing for fast steam trains with a speed of around 80mph (which as far as I've been able to ascertain seems to have been about the standard for long-distance trains at the time), it would probably take an hour to get the orphans organised, down to the station and onto the train, so there would be a journey-time of three to four hours each way. I suppose if they set off at 8am they could be in, say, St David's by noon and stay till about 5pm, but what would be the point of making such a very long journey in order to stay for only five hours? If Tom's cave is in any of these locations, then really the only sensible conclusion is that the orphanage must have taken the orphans there at least for a long weekend: but Mrs Cole's description of the trip as "an outing" and "tak[ing] them out" sounds more like a day trip.
Natural black cliffs in England and Wales, adapted from Streetmap.co.uk
However, St David's/Porthclais seems to have the best cliffs - high and steep and black with outlying black rocks just off the shore, and requiring special equipment in order to climb them. The nearest village, St David's, is rather large, but St David's is inland a bit, so Dumbledore's "village of sorts about halfway along the cliffs" might possibly have been the complex of caravan-park, cottages-to-let and organic cheese factory at Caerfai Farm - especially if it was already taking in tourists in some capacity in the 1930s.
Nevertheless, the problem with these again is distance. Although they are somewhat nearer – and much more likely holiday destinations – than Workington, even Ilfracombe, the closest of them, is about 180 miles from London as the crow flies. Lizard Point, Aberdaron and St David's are respectively around 250, 225 and 240 miles from London, and Aberdaron especially is in a rather inaccessible position.
Even allowing for fast steam trains with a speed of around 80mph (which as far as I've been able to ascertain seems to have been about the standard for long-distance trains at the time), it would probably take an hour to get the orphans organised, down to the station and onto the train, so there would be a journey-time of three to four hours each way. I suppose if they set off at 8am they could be in, say, St David's by noon and stay till about 5pm, but what would be the point of making such a very long journey in order to stay for only five hours? If Tom's cave is in any of these locations, then really the only sensible conclusion is that the orphanage must have taken the orphans there at least for a long weekend: but Mrs Cole's description of the trip as "an outing" and "tak[ing] them out" sounds more like a day trip.
Alternatively, about a hundred miles from London, in the area around Kimmeridge Bay on the Dorset coast, there are dark grey, fossil- and shale-rich cliffs which could pass for black in the evening light. Their position relative to London is marked on the map above, along with the positions of Porthclais, Boscastle etc.. They form part of the fossil-rich "Jurassic coast" World Heritage Site, which stretches all the way from Exmouth in Devon (near Ottery St Catchpole) to Studland in Dorset, just west of Poole.
The accompanying chart of the main geological features of the area shows which stretches of cliff have the dark "Kimmeridge clay" at the surface, and which can be ruled out because they have sandy beaches at the foot.
The best-known stretch of these grey cliffs is a beautiful near-circular cove called Chapman's Pool. The cave can't be in Chapman's Pool itself because there are beaches there, but many of the cliffs round the corner from Chapman's Pool do seem to go straight down into the water, at least when the tide isn't right out. View across Chapman\'s Pool to Houns-tout Cliff, from Visiting Purbeck The area is said to be dangerous (see Fossil Collecting in Dorset) because walkers there can easily be cut off by the tide, and although it's possible to climb down to the beach in Chapman's Pool the route down is very long. If the orphans' "outing" was indeed the day-trip it sounds like, then it's perfectly possible they were taken for a day's educational fossil-hunting in beautiful Chapman's Pool, and Tom wandered off around the coast to somewhere even more dangerous and inaccessible. We only have Dumbledore's View down to Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner of Clavell\'s Hard © Jim Champion at Geograph opinion that the orphans were meant to stay at the top of the cliff, and he is only speculating. It would be appealing to think that the sinister Horcrux-cave was sited in the stretch of cliff which is charmingly called Cuddle. The most likely site, however, is Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner formed by the promontory called Clavell's Hard. This has very dark rock, no beach except for a skirt of grey clay, old mine-workings and a cave leading in under the cliff: albeit a large, open one which seems to be above the water-line. You can see more views of the cliffs around Kimmeridge, including a detailed close-up of Blackstone Bay with geological notes, at the University of Southampton's site on Geology of the Wessex Coast of Southern England: Kimmeridge - The Blackstone - Oil Shale and at Explore the South West Coast Path: Lulworth - Chapman's Pool. Conclusion Porthclais in south-west Wales, near Haverford West, has the best cliffs, which answer the description perfectly - sheer, black, unclimbable without special equipment, with jagged black rocks standing out in the sea. The "village of sorts" where the orphans stayed would probably be the large Caerfai farm complex cum tourist campsite near the top of the cliffs. However, at about 240 miles from London it's probably too far away for a day trip: we would have to assume that the orphans' "outing" was for a weekend, or even for a week or two. On the other hand, if we want to stick to the orphans having gone there on a day-trip, then the Kimmeridge area in Dorset will do. It's not perfect - most of the cliffs there are definitely grey rather than black and it tends to have small rocks in the water rather than big boulders - but if you imagine it sexed up a little for story purposes it could fit the bill, and there are a number of very small villages and hamlets in the area which Dumbledore might be referring to.
The area is said to be dangerous (see Fossil Collecting in Dorset) because walkers there can easily be cut off by the tide, and although it's possible to climb down to the beach in Chapman's Pool the route down is very long. If the orphans' "outing" was indeed the day-trip it sounds like, then it's perfectly possible they were taken for a day's educational fossil-hunting in beautiful Chapman's Pool, and Tom wandered off around the coast to somewhere even more dangerous and inaccessible. We only have Dumbledore's View down to Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner of Clavell\'s Hard © Jim Champion at Geograph opinion that the orphans were meant to stay at the top of the cliff, and he is only speculating. It would be appealing to think that the sinister Horcrux-cave was sited in the stretch of cliff which is charmingly called Cuddle. The most likely site, however, is Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner formed by the promontory called Clavell's Hard. This has very dark rock, no beach except for a skirt of grey clay, old mine-workings and a cave leading in under the cliff: albeit a large, open one which seems to be above the water-line. You can see more views of the cliffs around Kimmeridge, including a detailed close-up of Blackstone Bay with geological notes, at the University of Southampton's site on Geology of the Wessex Coast of Southern England: Kimmeridge - The Blackstone - Oil Shale and at Explore the South West Coast Path: Lulworth - Chapman's Pool. Conclusion Porthclais in south-west Wales, near Haverford West, has the best cliffs, which answer the description perfectly - sheer, black, unclimbable without special equipment, with jagged black rocks standing out in the sea. The "village of sorts" where the orphans stayed would probably be the large Caerfai farm complex cum tourist campsite near the top of the cliffs. However, at about 240 miles from London it's probably too far away for a day trip: we would have to assume that the orphans' "outing" was for a weekend, or even for a week or two. On the other hand, if we want to stick to the orphans having gone there on a day-trip, then the Kimmeridge area in Dorset will do. It's not perfect - most of the cliffs there are definitely grey rather than black and it tends to have small rocks in the water rather than big boulders - but if you imagine it sexed up a little for story purposes it could fit the bill, and there are a number of very small villages and hamlets in the area which Dumbledore might be referring to.
It would be appealing to think that the sinister Horcrux-cave was sited in the stretch of cliff which is charmingly called Cuddle. The most likely site, however, is Blackstone Bay, tucked into the corner formed by the promontory called Clavell's Hard. This has very dark rock, no beach except for a skirt of grey clay, old mine-workings and a cave leading in under the cliff: albeit a large, open one which seems to be above the water-line. You can see more views of the cliffs around Kimmeridge, including a detailed close-up of Blackstone Bay with geological notes, at the University of Southampton's site on Geology of the Wessex Coast of Southern England: Kimmeridge - The Blackstone - Oil Shale and at Explore the South West Coast Path: Lulworth - Chapman's Pool.
Porthclais in south-west Wales, near Haverford West, has the best cliffs, which answer the description perfectly - sheer, black, unclimbable without special equipment, with jagged black rocks standing out in the sea. The "village of sorts" where the orphans stayed would probably be the large Caerfai farm complex cum tourist campsite near the top of the cliffs. However, at about 240 miles from London it's probably too far away for a day trip: we would have to assume that the orphans' "outing" was for a weekend, or even for a week or two.
On the other hand, if we want to stick to the orphans having gone there on a day-trip, then the Kimmeridge area in Dorset will do. It's not perfect - most of the cliffs there are definitely grey rather than black and it tends to have small rocks in the water rather than big boulders - but if you imagine it sexed up a little for story purposes it could fit the bill, and there are a number of very small villages and hamlets in the area which Dumbledore might be referring to.
