Tintagel Walk

After a few days of really dreadful weather, gales and rain and ice and hail and sleet (sometimes all at the same time) I was quite surprised when Sunday dawned calm, clear and even warmish. Surprised but grateful, as we'd scheduled a walk around Tintagel for the morning. A walk described in the book as 'tough' - and it was!


It didn't seem too bad to start with, crossing muddy fields from stile to stile with three dogs on leads because there was different livestock in each field (cows, sheep, horses, more sheep, etc) although the stiles were those lovely traditional Cornish stone ones with a big sharp blade on top, which the dogs don't like, and I managed to fall off the third one! Muddy but only slightly bruised I was happy enough to carry on. Down into the valley of an unnamed river at Halgabron the path took us upstream a little way, over a bridge then back up the other side of the valley, passing St Piran's well and along lanes into Rocky Valley.


Rocky Valley was somewhat of a disappointment to Roz, who remembered it from her childhood, because half of it now appears to be a holiday compound, with 'keep out' and 'dogs on leads' signs and lots of fences and lawns. We had a bit of a problem with the injunction to keep the dogs on leads because the path was very slippery, very steep, moss covered tarmac, most unsafe when being pulled along behind a dog. Still, that was only the top part of the valley, and we carried on through the rocky bit, past Trewethet Mill with its bronze age labyrinth carvings and trees decorated with votive ribbons. Not quite sure why, but there's one elaborate wind chime made from limpet shells, the caps from champagne corks and a newcastle brown ale crown cap, among other things. As we crossed the bridge below the mill we met a young lady walking in the opposite direction - the first walker we had seen all morning.


Where Rocky Valley meets the sea there is a narrow gorge into which the sea was pounding with considerable force and greater spectacle. From the top above the valley we had looked down and seen that there was a considerable swell running, but from sea level it was much rougher, after the gales of the previous few days, pounding into the gorge. The cliffs there are slate and form natural steps down the side of the gorge - tempting to the dogs, but not to me!

From there we were on the coastpath and turned back along the cliffs towards Tintagel. There had been nothing 'tough' about the walk up to this point, but the last bit was pretty difficult. There are steps cut into the steeper (well, almost all the) bits, but the whole path was very, very muddy. Climbing fifty or so steps at a time when you can feel the mud trying to suck the boots off your feet at every step is quite wearing. And then, of course, there are another fifty steps down, only to go straight back up again. Several times. Lovely views, though. Right down at the bottom of Bossinney Cliffs was a bay full of tiny surfers, a couple of hundred feet below us on the path - they must have been really dedicated to have walked so far down off the road to play, and then having to climb back up afterwards. From what I could see, they weren't getting much opportunity to surf anyway, just paddling about beyond the surf line being patient.

Half way up the third or fourth flight of mud steps we met someone coming down - the same girl who had crossed our path in Rocky Valley! I still haven't worked out how she could possibly have done that...

By the time we got back to Tintagel we had used all the three hours recommended in the book for this four-mile walk (having reckoned originally to do it in half the time, of course). The sky was clouding over and the wind was getting up, but at least we had had beautiful weather for our walk. A big all-day breakfast in a local hostelry was very welcome before the long drive home in the rain.

Noss Mayo Walk

Comparatively warm weather - temperature just up into double figures. We were invited over the Tamar into the South Hams for a walk today, starting from Noss Mayo up along a bit of the coast path to Warren Point then down again for lunch at the Ship Inn. Westerly gales had been forecast, but Noss Mayo is well inland and sheltered so it felt quite balmy and mild as we set out. I'm glad I took my hat and gloves, though, because once we got on to the coast path the westerly gales were very much in evidence. I was wearing a lovely windproof jacket which, unfortunately, is a bit big round the hips; it filled up like a balloon and nearly lifted me off my feet. Not all that comfortable, but it made an amusing photograph... I was very glad that we were doing the walk in an anticlockwise direction because we met quite a lot of walkers coming the other way who were struggling with the wind in their faces.

A bracing but very pleasant walk was followed by a very pleasant lunch at the Ship. I like going on occasional adventures out of Cornwall.

Lapwings

I saw a couple of lapwings at Churchtown this afternoon, in the field where horses graze between the green lane and the cemetery. This is the first time I have ever seen lapwings in Cornwall, and was a great surprise. I wonder whether they are merely passing through, or looking for somewhere to settle.

When I lived on Harris the lapwings were a constant presence day and night - if you couldn't hear them you could see them - and in the nesting season were quite aggressive if you walked near a nest. The only place I have seen them in quantity since them was up at Strensham in the fields there. I thought they only liked flat grassland or arable fields, and that Cornwall would have been too hilly, but the girl I was talking to at Churchtown who also saw them said that she had been brought up in the Scillies and there were a lot of lapwings there.

While we were comparing notes on lapwings, Ty was haring round the fields with her two Borzois. One of them is quite young, although many times Ty's size, and it was comical to watch him being all submissive and puppyish. Ty, unusually for him, was quite happy to play too.

Ice in the Creek

The Big Freeze seems to be over. Well, it was a big freeze for here, anyway, two nights and two days with the temperature below zero - the stream was frozen and the creek itself was full of ice. It's put paid to all the unseasonal flowering things; even the heliotrope looks all withered and unhappy. There's blackthorn in blossom up at Churchtown, though.

This afternoon almost all the ice had gone from the creek, and there were a dozen swans there, including two which still have brown plumage, presumably the ones I saw at Waterside. They were all milling about quite calmly until suddenly one of the brown ones ran across the surface of the water, wings flapping wildly. I thought he was attempting to take off but actually he was just eager to be first to the crumbs which the lady who lives overlooking the creek was throwing off her balcony on to the shore. The other young one used the same technique to get on shore, while all the rest paddled as usual. Ty and I decided that we didn't want to walk past them while they were hoovering up the bread so made a tactical withdrawl back up the coombe.

Back in the garden, today for the first time I have actually seen a bird using the fat ball feeder, which has been up there for six weeks or so. It was a young male sparrow, obviously a little more adventurous than the rest, as he is the only sparrow to use the peanut feeder, as well. The others will learn, though. The peanut feeder I put up on the silver birch is being used more and more by the little groups of mixed tits and finches that pass through. Very few of them come down to the feeders in the garden, especially when there are big groups of sparrows quarrelling over what's there.

Here we go again!

Well, it's another year. 2009. I'm not sure what to make of it, really, I gave up long since making long term plans, new year resolutions, etc.

In fact, this was the first time we've been out to play at New Year for about seven years. Most of the last few years we've been apart anyway, so there wasn't much point. I'd got a New Year's Day Proper Walk booked in - the Two Valleys starting and ending at St Neot, so when Roger and Doreen invited us over to Downderry to see in the New Year it seemed like a good idea for them to bring Ron to join the walkers for the New Year Breakfast at the pub there.

I was under the obviously mistaken impression that public places such as public houses did the Big Ben or countdown thing at midnight at the very least, but where we were nothing happened - various people were checking their watches or mobile phones for an approximation of the right time, but nobody got it quite right. Still, we met a fair few people we haven't seen for a while, so it was quite pleasant, then a very short walk home to Roger's house. I actually got up a couple of minutes before the alarm went off, so that was OK. The weather wasn't quite as cold as it has been lately, but quite windy and a bit misty damp. We did the walk anti clockwise, which means it starts with a very steep climb up out of the village but the rest is easier. For the first five minutes I was giving serious thought to giving up because I couldn't breathe, but then I realised that the other three were all suffering from heavy colds and they weren't doing any better than me anyway! We only met one group of walkers going the other way in the whole six miles. There were actual primroses out on the hedges right up high. It was altogether a thoroughly enjoyable way to start the day.

When we got to the pub the Downderry party had grown to seven, outnumbering us four walkers, but they managed to find us two tables together so that we could all talk and eat. I'd naively expected that we'd go home after lunch, but Ron and Roger, egged on by various friends and relations, stuck it out until 7pm! I had one glass of wine with lunch, probably far too much fizzy water afterwards, and ended up only being able to talk to Doreen (who was also sober chauffering) because everyone else was on a different plane altogether. Ty worked the room with his usual understated charm and no fewer than three people tried to take him off me and keep him forever. He's a credit to me, which is more than can be said for Ron... How is it that I can turn a horrible unloved puppy into everybody's friend and I can't make a man do anything at all, even after thirty years?

I'm getting a cold now. I had two days backache and high temperature, then yesterday I woke up with a blocked nose (it's not blocked now - it's running like a tap!). Lemsip and whisky may or may not be good for me.

Happy New Year.