BBgt

Oh dear, now I have to admit that I don't recall seeing daffodils! Were we a bit late, do you think? I absolutely love daffs, so you'd think I'd have noticed.

I actually thought about your suggestion of having dinner at the Lanhydrock Hotel, Ann, but we opted for the convenience of a quick sandwich at Lanhydrock and dinner at our cottage. Great suggestion for other travelers, though. I'd love to go back to Cornwall and spend more time a bit further east - next time!

annhig

sorry, BBgt - much too late for daffs [and you WOULD have noticed them!] - they would have been there in February and March.

Were you in time for the bluebells? The woods to the left of the little road down from the carpark to the House is full of them in early May, but I'm not sure if they'd have been there when you were.

As you say, so much more to see, you must come back!

BBgt

Ha! - I forget that spring in Cornwall (and all of England, for that matter) comes much earlier than here mountains. We're still buried under many feet of snow in February/March.

We did see a few bluebells, but I'm guessing we were a little late for the best of them. Last time we were in England was in April 2014, and we saw more of them then.

We barely scratched the surface of places I'd like to visit, but we sure enjoyed what we saw.

BBgt

Wednesday, May 25 - Penwith Peninsula

We had a lazy start to our day - hadn't quite committed to what we wanted to do, and just puttered around with breakfast and a bit of laundry. Eventually we got moving and decided to do the drive around the Penwith Peninsula, starting at Cape Cornwall since we'd already been to the Minack and Sennen. We left the cottage late morning and got to Cape Cornwall in under half an hour.

This ended up being my favorite driving day. By now I was far more comfortable with the tiny lanes and was fairly confident in the towns. I daresay I was actually having fun driving. Our GPS (which came with the car) led us to a lookout point for Cape Cornwall, but I think we missed the real parking area for the Cape because we could see what looked like a larger car park with facilities just down the coast. No matter - we had a spectacular viewpoint and walked around for a bit admiring the vista.

Since we'd left the cottage rather late, we were ready for lunch by the time we'd seen Cape Cornwall, so we headed back to St. Just in search of food. We located a public car park fairly quickly and spotted the King's Arms, which proved to be a very atmospheric pub with excellent soup served by a very friendly young woman. She shared a bit of the pub's history with me. Apparently it had been re-purposed from several cottages that had served as housing for workers when the church next door was being built. We enjoyed our lunch, then wandered next door to see the church (St. Just in Penwith Parish Church). We hadn't set out to visit St. Just initially, but it's a charming little town and we quite liked our stop there.

Next stop (only minutes away) was the Botallack Mine - another National Trust site. We arrived at the parking area and entered what appeared to be a visitor center, but as it turned out, it was only just being finished with fresh paint and such, and was rather bare inside. No matter, though - an extremely friendly lady (presumably N.T. employee) greeted us and explained that they weren't quite open yet, but to please come in and have a cup of tea as she was just having one herself. She led us to some chairs set up so visitors could watch a short video about the filming of Poldark at the site, then went off to fetch the tea. Five minutes later she reappeared with tea and biscuits, and we ended up staying for half an hour or so, drinking our tea and visiting with this lovely, lovely person.

Finally we headed back outside to see the ruins of the mining structures. Talk about atmospheric - if stones could talk, what an interesting story they'd have told. I haven't seen Poldark, but can well imagine why they filmed here. It was incredibly evocative and the scenery was just spectacular.

Our next stop was the Levant Mine & Beam Engine. We used our N.T. touring passes here, and although it was well presented, frankly, neither of us were that interested in the actual engine. Botallack's ruins were more arresting, in our opinion. Anyone more interested in mechanical things would have enjoyed the site, I'm sure.

We continued along the coast drive (the B3306, I believe), which was quite scenic and fun to drive. The road was two narrow lanes in most places, and fairly wide open with not many blind spots, so it was a relatively easy drive. It helped that there weren't many people on the road when we were there.

We'd read about Zennor and the Mermaid Chair in its church, which commemorated the story of the mermaid who fell in love with a local lad when she heard him singing and lured him to the sea. We parked in Zennor and walked to the church, saw the Mermaid chair, and then couldn't quite figure out where the rest of the "picturesque village" indicated on the map might be. It seemed there was the church, a pub, and a few houses. Quite honestly, we had found St. Just more interesting, but no matter - we'd seen the Mermaid Chair and were happy to head home for the day.

I'd plugged our destination of Marazion into the GPS, and assumed it would take us back via the B roads shown on the map. We started out on a B road, but at some point we were led onto an even smaller road that apparently didn't rate the "B" designation. It was just a track, really, with flower-strewn hedges on either side and only a few marginally wider spots here and there to pass. Fortunately, we didn't encounter a single car, which is probably why I can say that this was the most fun I've ever had driving in England - seriously! This was smile-on-my-face, singing-while-I-drove fun, with Mom taking photos of the road in front of us because it was just so pretty. We had driven along like this for a few minutes when we crested a hill, and WOW! There was St. Michael's Mount, sitting in a deep blue bay and perfectly framed by lush, green hedges - just like a photograph only better, because it was real and that's where we were headed (well, close to it anyway). What a fun ride. It was almost disappointing when our little lane met up with the B3309. That 10 or so minutes of perfect Cornish bliss will stick with me for years to come.

After such a successful day, we decided we'd earned dinner out at the Godolphin Arms. We parked our car, stepped into the now-familiar environs of the restaurant, and had the biggest burgers we'd ever eaten with views of Mounts Bay all around us. The meal was topped off by the most amazing chocolate-orange cheese cake - picture-worthy, and oh-so-delicious.

We made sure to look out our windows that night to see the Mount floodlit in all its glory before someone turned off the lights. What a great day.

annhig

It does indeed sound like a magical day, BBgt. Botallak is indeed pretty atmospheric, and how nice of the helper [probably a volunteer] to make you a cuppa - she was probably keen to have your company!

And fancy you taking so well to the roads - you sound like a natural.

BBgt

I'm sure you're right about the helper, Ann. She was a lovely lady, whatever her role. I was as surprised as anyone to realize I had quite an affinity for those Cornish roads!

janisj

>> I was as surprised as anyone to realize I had quite an affinity for those Cornish roads!<<

People tell me I'm crazy when I say I actually <i>enjoy</i> driving in the UK . . .

BBgt

I believe you, Janis. ;-)

Bostonblondie226

Not through reading this yet, but really enjoying it -- especially the bit about St. Andrews! Thanks for a fun read

Sue_xx_yy

Thank you for this report and all the detail. Loved the description of the driving! In Scotland, we found 'single track' to be less onerous than 'B' roads, no idea why.

Did you have a specific reason for going to the Levant Beam engine when there is the Geevor mine (also - I think! - an NT property) virtually next door? I ask because to us, at least, the Levant sounds interesting - but its hours in spring are more irregular than Geevor (or so it seems - I hate the NT website format for opening hours.)

BBgt

Thanks for the comments, Bostonblondie226 and Su_xx_yy!

We didn't have a specific reason at all for skipping Geevor. In fact, we planned to go to both, but somehow missed it. I think Levant would be very worthwhile if you're interested in the actual mechanical aspects of Cornish mining, and if it's open when you're there. We were just more interested in the "romantic" aspects, I guess - the fact that the local economy depended on mining for so long, and then the industry just went away - ghosts of miners past and all that. I'm sure Geevor would be interesting for you as well.

LCBoniti

Love all the soup lunches - for some reason, although I am not normally much of a soup eater, I love the soup in England and Scotland. Yum!

Also loved your description of the "below B" road drive. That must have been so spectacular.

BBgt

I'm not usually much of a soup eater, either, but every soup we had was delicious, and the chunky bread served with it made it even better!

It's funny the things that end up being "wow" moments sometimes, isn't it? That drive was probably very routine for the locals, but for us it was really special.

annhig

<<We didn't have a specific reason at all for skipping Geevor. In fact, we planned to go to both, but somehow missed it. I think Levant would be very worthwhile if you're interested in the actual mechanical aspects of Cornish mining, and if it's open when you're there>>

For anyone who is interested in the technology, [or isn't!] I can thoroughly recommend the Heartlands complex at Pool [half way between Redruth and Camborne, signposted from Camborne but not from Redruth] which is brilliant. They have taken an old winding house [which was used to lift men, machines and ore out of the mine] and converted it into a explanatory exhibition, with photos and voices of the miners, plus an excellent film about Cornwall's mining history. Our german visitors [who earlier in their stay had turned down the chance to see the Telegraph Museum at Porthcurno because they weren't interested in science!] loved it.

There's also a "diaspora garden" where they have a series of gardens planted with the flora of all the places where cornish miners have settled - from Australia, to S Africa, to the USA ...as they say, wherever there's a hole in the ground, there's a cornishman at the bottom of it.

janisj

>>where cornish miners have settled - from Australia, to S Africa, to the USA ...as they say, wherever there's a hole in the ground, there's a cornishman at the bottom of it.<<

Bit of an off topic . . . but where I live in northern California a LOT of Cornish (and Welsh) came in the 1850's to work in the mines during the Gold Rush.

There are still Cornish Christmas and Welsh chorus festivals all throughout the Sierra foothills.

http://www.seecalifornia.com/christm...christmas.html

annhig

Their Christmas festival sounds wonderful, JJ - I wonder what carols they sing. There is a big tradition of Cornish carols which are very different to the ones with which most people are familiar - I wonder if they took some of them with them.

Something else the miners took with them were pasties - there are Mexican villages where they have their own versions, apparently. and while we're [sort of] off topic, can I dispel the myth that traditional pasties had a savoury end, and a sweet end? that simply isn't true; they were all savoury made with meat, onion, potato and turnip. [and no chick pea and lentil ones either!]

BBgt

This is a fascinating diversion. I had never given much thought to the heritage of the miners who came west during the gold rush, but this conversation has awakened a new curiosity! I did a quick search and found this site:

https://www.cornish-mining.org.uk/de...-north-america

And then this interesting article about a mining town in Colorado that owed its (short-lived) success to Cornish miners:

http://www.coloradomagazineonline.co...nishMiners.htm

annhig

BBgt - our nearest town houses the Cornish Studies library where they keep all the records of the diaspora; it's where "Cornish Jacks" come to look up their histories and try to find their ancestors.

And it wasn't just gold of course - cornish miners had the skills to get almost anything out of rock, even the hardest, because they had learnt how to mine on granite.

It is a fascinating heritage and something about which I knew absolutely nothing before we moved here, but I've been very impressed by how important a part of life it is, though the mines fell silent about 20 years ago.

stevelyon

Some great information here which I have just caught up with (on holiday recently). Enjoyed reading about York and noted the guest house which you seemed to like. Will take my time and turn my attention to your notes on Cornwall next.

BBgt

Thank you for reading, Stevelyon. I'll try to get back to my report this evening - rather busy day yesterday.

I only have a few days left - makes be rather sad to be nearing the end of our trip again!