DARTH

Well it had to happen, it usually does when we are on holiday – one of us started to feel unwell, me as it happens this time. This also coincided with some particularly wet weather, which wasn’t good news as today was scheduled for visiting some of the fishing villages along the south coast. The forecast did at least indicate it would brighten up later on. After breakfast we headed off anyway hoping the forecast was indeed correct.

We headed east along the coast towards Looe first, crossing the small car ferry at Fowey across to Bodinnick. We followed the twisty country roads and lanes through the wind and rain to Looe. The rain slackened off a bit when we got there and as we had waterproof jackets on anyway went for a wander round the harbour anyway. The rain got heavier so we ducked into a tea shop for a coffee. It proved to be a good decision as the rain stopped so we were able to wander round the other side of the harbour. It would have been nice to see it when it was dry and sunny, but what can you do when you are there in March.

Looe Harbour

It was then back to the car and off to our next stop, Polperro. The rain came back on for a bit, but had stopped by the time we got to Polperro. This was a place that had been recommended we visit by more than one person. It is a quaint little fishing village, with some very narrow streets. Cars can only get so far on into the village, although as can be seen here some people ignore the signs. I’m sure there are more samples out there of this sort of stupidity. The rain had stopped and it had even started to brighten up, so it made for pleasant wandering round weather. It really is a lovely wee place.

Polperro Pirates

As you know walking around like we’d been sightseeing is thirsty work so we decided to stop for a drink at The Blue Peter. It was a great wee pub, with a and open fire, cozy feel and really nice beer. What this necessary stop meant was that when we left the pub the tide had come in a bit more, which allowed for a few more photos with a different view.

Polperro Harbour

On our way back to the car we got extremely lucky as the heavens opened just as we were getting back in. So it was a wet drive for the early part of the drive back to Bodinnick along some very narrow lanes. Part of the fun about being in this part of the country was the roads, although I’d hate to be driving along some of these during high season when you have people not used to narrow roads. It must drive the locals nuts.

Once back across the ferry we headed into Fowey for a look around. Of course there were a lot of ports used, but Fowey was used during the D-Day landings as an assembly port for some of the US troops heading across to Normandy and it seemed appropriate I mention this as it is nearing the 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings as I write this. Nowadays it seems to be a haven for entertainers with a number having second homes around the town, with the inevitable effect that prices are pushed up adversely affecting the locals. The town itself very nice to walk around and if it has been a bit later we may have stopped for dinner, although it was a bit of a trek up the steep hill back to the car-park where we’d parked.

Our final stop of the day was Charlestown which is the port for St Austell. It was quite a small harbour but they did have a couple of the tall ships that are based there in the inner harbour.

Tall ship in charlestown harbour

There were three in total all being worked on to a greater or lesser extent. There are still a few fishermen that use the port and as if to illustrate the point here is a picture of a fishing boat and some lobster pots:

Lobster pots and fishing boat

By now we were getting a bit hungry so we decided rather than go back to the B&B and then come back out again, we’d have an early dinner and then head out for a drink after we’d got back to the B&B. We ended up in the White Hart for a drink as it was one of the places that had been recommended and figured we’d pop in for a drink first before eating there the following evening.

Another day where the weather promised to be rubbish, still the main plans for today involved being inside or underground. The lurgy had fully taken hold today and I hardly ate anything at breakfast, throat was really sore and just a general crappy feeling. We’d both been keen to see a mine and given Cornwall’s mining history thought this would be quite easy, how wrong we were. We set of for the Poldark mine. It was a nice enough drive there, only when we got there we found it wasn’t open until the 8th April, bugger. This meant plan B was enacted for the morning and we headed to Falmouth to have a look round Pendennis castle. Now I’ll admit at this point that the only reason I was aware of the castle was because of that programme Three Men in More Than One Boat where Rory McGrath, Griff Rhys Jones and Dara O’Briain make there way around the cornish coast on various boats before heading to Scilly and they stopped at Falmouth and went to the castle, was very glad we did though it was very interesting. It was just a shame that the extensions that had been added during the second world war were closed because of some land slippage in the area. We got quite lucky as we’d essentially finished our wanderings when the heavens opened so we ducked into the tea shop for some light refreshment, before having a browse round the shop and then heading back to St Austell and the afternoon’s activities.

View of Pendennis keep

First action was that I went for a lie down to see if it would help, it did and was ready for our visit to the St Austell Brewery. Fortunately we made it in time for the last tour, in actual fact the tour was just us and the guide so we definitely got lucky there. It was most interesting seeing how they worked. In fact some of the machinery is not quite the original but certainly from the very early days of the brewery. It was here that we learned that the Seven Stars was the original pub that the brewery founder (Walter Hicks) started with and that the White Hart is their training hotel and bar. It is still a family owned brewery and as it was Friday afternoon many of the staff were enjoying a post work tipple in the bar. Of course the best part of doing these sorts of tours are the free samples at the end, and very nice they were too. We then headed off for our final dinner in Cornwall at the White Hart. We called it a night fairly early as we had a long drive ahead of us on Saturday.

I felt much better after the a decent nights sleep although Adele took the first stint as we headed north. We opted for a less than direct route initially and once back on the main road stopped at the Jamaica Inn on Bodmin Moor. It was then on the road again for a while before our first changeover. In the past long drives like this we would only have changed once, this time we opted for driving for a couple of hours each and then changing. This worked much better as neither of us were as tired as we had been in the past.

Looking back over the week it had been great but was over far too quickly. It was a shame that we didn’t get the weather of the first few days all the way through, but that’s the risk when you holiday in the UK in March. We will be back as there were some things we didn’t get to do that we wanted and would consider the same time of year again as it is quieter, but we would need to plan things a little better as you are restricted with the opening times of some of the attractions. Even the drive wasn’t that bad, and we may head all the way down without a stopover the next time.

Update (05/06/2009): Forgot to say, in case you haven’t seen, a selection of the photos from the trip can be seen here for Cornwall and here for Bristol.