A Cornish Adventure Part One.

 This year marked Himself’s 50^th birthday, I knew he wouldn’t want a party but wasn’t sure what he would want to do instead. So in January we had the following conversation;

Me: “ What do you want to do for your birthday?”

Him: “Not be here”

Me: “Where would you like to be? Cornwall?”

Him: “Yes”

Me: “St Ives?”

Him: “Yes”

This led to me trawling through various options before settling on renting a holiday apartment with a company called Aspect. They are an independent company based in Cornwall, I liked their ethos, and their customer service was excellent. I narrowed down a couple of places and was going to surprise Him.... but then remembered what he is like, so I showed him. 

He declared he would like to be able to lie in bed and look at a sea view if possible. The lovely Atlantic Heights B&B had spoiled him in that respect! 

 So I went back to the drawing board, then I found an option that was on the Porthmeor side of St Ives that we love, and once he approved, I booked it.

                                                       A sea view from the bedroom = tick.

 A friend suggested visiting The Minack Theatre so I checked out what was on and it seemed the gods were smiling on us because Fisherman’s Friends were playing towards the end of our stay.

 Very randomly given his life long love of loud rock/metal, Himself loves Fisherman’s Friends (as do I) so it was a no brainer. I logged on to buy tickets only to find they weren’t going on sale for a few weeks. I stuck a note in my work calendar for the date and when that popped up at 9am logged onto their website again. The tickets didn’t go on sale until 10am, so at 10am I logged in again. 

Lordy, it was like getting tickets for Glastonbury or something similar! It was literally seconds past 10am and I couldn't get on, when I did manage to connect I was 64^th in the queue, by the time I was 1^st the evening performance had sold out on the day we wanted. Thankfully, I managed to snag two tickets for the matinee, which we decided was actually a better option given that the weather and travel arrangements were uncertain.       

 This was all before Dad died so as it turned out the time away was very much needed by both of us when the beginning of May finally arrived.

 The Thursday before we were due to leave, I was at my pilates class and one of the other ladies was talking about going on holiday the next week. She said she was having to get her son to drive them because of the train strikes. Eek. I checked when I got home, and sure enough there was a strike for the day we were due to travel home. Bollocks. 

We couldn’t leave a day early because that was when we have our Minack tickets, so instead we decided to book an extra day but in Penzance and leave from there, as it’s where the trains begin. The Premier Inn by the station was full, so after some hunting I managed to find a lovely B&B for 1 night.

 They then announced additional strikes. SIGH.

I rang the B&B to see if we could do an extra night, but they were fully booked. They very kindly suggested somewhere else, and thankfully I managed to snag their last room for both nights. Whilst I will say I support the strikes wholeheartedly; I could have done without them right at this particular time.

 Our journey down was painless, the hill up to our apartment was not! 

It being every bit as tough as I remembered from previous visits to St Ives, but well worth it for the sea views. 

We unpacked, had a drink, and headed out to stretch our legs and reacquaint ourselves with the town. We bought chips for dinner which we ate sat on a wall watching the sea, before calling in at the Co-op for a few provisions towards breakfast and a bottle of wine for that night. They were reducing stock so we also ended up with an apple pie and tub of custard for less than £2 for both!

I have to say it was lovely to not have to wake up early for a hotel breakfast. It was the Coronation that day, so after waking up late we ate breakfast in bed watching some of it on TV.

We then took the opportunity to walk to the Tesco on the outskirts of town and do a food shop for the week whilst it was quiet. It was a glorious morning; they had set up a big screen on the seawall and people were watching from the beach, all set for the day with picnics and deckchairs. 

what a view, you can't help but feel your cares lift.

We did a leisurely food shop and caught a taxi back, as neither of us could face that hill laden with heavy bags!

By the time we had packed it away and had some lunch, the weather had made one of the sudden and dramatic changes Cornwall is known for. A thick sea fog was rolling in blanketing everything in its path. 

We had planned to go for a walk along the clifftop towards Zennor and decided to still go. I’m so glad we did. It was incredibly atmospheric, feeling at times like you were literally on the edge of the world.

We cut back inland and came into St Ives via a route we had never been before.

 We awoke the following day to glorious sunshine and clear skies, so we decided to walk the cliffs in the other direction to Lelant. The previous time we did this route I was not only just getting back into walking but also tackled the walk with a mammoth hangover to boot. I managed the 4 miles there, but had to catch the bus back. This time we walked both ways. 

We called into the same pub as we had then, The Badger Inn in Lelant. Only this time I enjoyed a pint of local cider rather than nursing a diet coke and wondering if I might throw up. 

They were doing a roaring trade in Sunday lunches but thankfully we managed to find a table. Whilst coming back from the ladies I spotted one of those racks of leaflets for local attractions and picked one up called ‘Pirates’. Long term readers of this blog may remember I am a bit of a fan of a pirate, so it looked right up my street. The exhibition was at the Maritime Museum in Falmouth.

 We knew the weather the next day was forecast to be wet so had been thinking about catching the bus or train to somewhere, that somewhere quickly turned out to be Falmouth and the Maritime Museum! With me saying I know this is your holiday, but… I REALLY want to do this. 

When we got back to the apartment, google showed us that you can catch a train to Falmouth, there are a couple of changes but it still was quite a short journey, so tickets were purchased and I was a happy bunny. 

Monday indeed dawned cold and grey. We walked to the station and by the time we made it to Falmouth it was drizzling. 

The museum is smallish but absolutely fascinating. We mooched until it was out allotted time for Pirates. 

The exhibition started with famous depictions of pirates from TV and film , followed by depictions in book, which was fine, but I did find myself hoping that wasn’t all there was. 

It was also pretty full of children ( I had forgotten it was a bank holiday!) Thankfully the second half of the exhibition was all about real life pirates, this was more like it and I was quickly engrossed. 

With hindsight it made sense to seize the attention of and entertain the kids in the first section.

                                                    Because I always find an elephant!

I particularly loved the different flags and the history of how they came about. I came out wanting to sew my own! 

I‘m thinking a teacup with crossed teaspoons for one option. 

 We mooched the rest of the museum. I found the Tattoo gallery particularly interesting, they had run an exhibition in 2015 that was so popular they had created a smaller permanent gallery. 

The sculpture of an Easter Island head made from particles of plastic beach pollution was particularly sobering.

Once we had had our fill and both made a purchase in the gift shop, we decided to have a look in the town, get a drink and maybe something to eat. 

Once we got outside it was clear the weather had got dramatically worse. The rain was coming down in biblical fashion. It didn't ease up it didn't stop. We looked in a few shops and ended up diving into Costa for a hot drink, absolutely soaked within about 20 minutes despite umbrellas.

It was so miserable we decided to just head home for hot showers and dry clothes. 

In fact the rain was so bad it caused areas of severe flooding in Devon and Cornwall and made the national news! When we got to Penzance the owners of the B&B we stayed in said the water was like a river running down their road and in all the years they had lived there they had never seen it like that, climate change is real people.

 Anyway we were very grateful to get in, get changed and chill with a glass of wine, our clothes and boots steaming in front of the radiator.    

My purchase from the museum was this pilchard on wheels. It just made me laugh and every time I look at it I can't help smiling. In my book that is a keeper when it comes to an ornament. 

My other purchase was this hanging seahorse. Love at first sight, I just need to find the right spot for it....

More to follow, including a book signing, epic walks and Fisherman's  Friends.