Restormel to Lanhydrock walk

Yesterday the dog and I went for a 'proper' walk. We walk every day, of course, but usually down the coombe to the creek or around Churchtown community nature reserve. Every so often, though, we get together with some friends and go somewhere. As someone else decides the route, it is always a surprise and often a delight.

The weather forecast wasn't all that promising; it was quite cool in the morning and heavy showers were threatened, but as it turned out it was perfect walking weather, sunny and warm with a gentle breeze.

We met in Restormel Castle car park. I had never visited the castle, and I still haven't seen it, because it is invisible from the car park (surrounded by trees, although at the top of a hill) and I didn't have the time or the inclination to pay to look around it. There isn't all that much left, apparently. The first part of the walk goes in the a perfectly straight and almost level line through a farmyard, between fields, past a sewage works and more fields to a gate at the edge of the Lanhydrock estate. The walking is easy, and the views across the valley are typically pastoral and attractive.

Lanhydrock is a National Trust property described as 'the finest house in Cornwall... ... with 450 acres of woodland' ( www.cornwall-online.co.uk/heritage-trail/heritage-national-trust/lanhydrock/Welcome.asp ), and from the gate we entered the estate from the footpath winds round through the woods and slightly uphill to the house itself. As you get nearer to the house the woodland changes from native English to more and more exotic species, mostly magnolias and rhododendrons, and opens out into a spectacular vista of crenellated towers and green parkland.

The house and immediate environs are not dog friendly (there were three collies, including mine), although they do provide a place to tie them up with shade and water, and we weren't there to look at the house anyway, so we turned right down the main treelined avenue and found a spot to have our picnic.

After eating, we continued down to the main gate and turned right on the road the short distance to five arched medieval Respryn bridge, newly rebuilt after an articulated lorry listened to his Satnav instead of using his eyes. It crosses the river Fowey and the current is quite strong, as Ty discovered. He loves a swim, and his favourite game is to allow himself to go downstream as fast as the current and his legs will take him, then battle his way back, barking happily all the way, then do it again. Under the bridge, though, he aimed for the end arch, but was turned round and taken backwards through the second one. At least five times that I saw. He would have stayed there all day doing it over and over again, but we had to move on...

Plan A was to return to Restormel Castle by road, making it a circular walk, but it was a little busy so instead we reentered the estate and followed an attractive riverside path for a while, crossed by a wooden bridge and stopped to let the dogs play in the water again (the other two don't swim, but love to splash about) and meandered through the woods again until we got to the gate where we had first entered and retraced our steps along the good straight path to Restormel.