Tuesday 1 May – Treyarnon to Port Isaac

The British love dogs – no, they really love dogs. They’re everywhere, in large numbers – including in the pubs. And there are few cats! But then the Cornish coast would be such a great place to own a dog – long almost deserted beaches to run them on – dog heaven!

Coming from Auckland, it takes you by surprise. Aucklanders love their cats and while there are quite a few dogs, nothing like we’ve seen here. And dogs aren’t allowed in pubs.

We were reminded yet again of this when we went to the local pub in Port Isaac for our dinner.

That was a well-earned dinner! Today’s walk, from the YHA Treyarnon Bay to Port Isaac, should have been a relatively less strenuous one. Instead, it turned into a bit of a slog, despite our having cut off a corner or two (it didn’t seem much point walking out and back along a peninsula when there was a perfectly good lane across the base).

Today is May day and the folk in Padstow were putting on a street party. Padstow is of course better known as Rick Stein-ville and is overrun with lots of ways to part people from their money. It succeeded in part with us – we each had an absolutely delicious Cornish pasty! Then it was on to the little pedestrian ferry that takes people across the wide estuary of the River Camel to complete our walk, along the cliffs, along quiet lanes and country paths, aiming (but failing) to beat the approaching rain.

Port Isaac is a gorgeous little fishing village, now a tourist attraction as it’s where Doc Martin is filmed, but still attractive. We dined in the Golden Lion pub, very old (established 1715 according to the inscription) and with ancient wooden flooring. Oh, and some absolutely scrumptious cod and chips!

Tomorrow will be a tough day, 27km of challenging coastal walks, lots of ups and downs….

Distance: 22km

Monday 30 April – Newquay to Treyarnon

What’s in a name? Actually, what’s in a letter?

The letter Z is not a common one, particularly in place names. When you come from New Zealand, as Peter does, and are overseas, his eye is drawn instinctively to the letter Z. Is it something about home? Well, maybe… quite possibly. It’s unlikely to be anything else. It’s a comfort when you are so far from home.

But not in Cornwall. Here, for some strange reason, quite a few places have a Z. Zennor, Marazion, Penzance – and today, Zacry’s Islands. Given Cornwall is at the geographical ‘end’ of England, it seems somehow appropriate they use the last letter of the alphabet so freely…

As for today – the troublesome wind was back !  And very blustery it was in places too !  Certainly strong enough to be buffeting Val around on the track – those packs just make for a bigger target for it to hit she reckons!  It made quite a difference to the days walking that is for sure – it is tougher walking in to the wind, as we were today.  Or was that just resistance training to help get us fit ? Either way we envied those walking back towards Newquay!

The birds were however enjoying it – using the updrafts and soaring freely, and at times swooping at a great rate of knots, for considerable lengths of time.  Absorbing to watch.  As were a few intrepid kite surfers!

We were very happy to arrive at tonight’s accommodation – the Treyarnon YHA. To escape the wind that is.  Nothing to do with the fact that they have a small bar serving tap beer and cider for us to relax with as we sat in the sunshine and just watched the tide coming in! Totally chilled out, making the most of the moment. Superb!

Day 6 – 20km

Sunday 29 April – Perranporth to Newquay

Peter writes:

For as long as I can remember, visits to the UK have not been complete without partaking of that great British institution – the Sunday newspapers, and in particular the Observer and the Sunday Times. Each is a mighty read, full of plenty of news, superb columnists, wonderful football writing, great background articles on a range of topics, and enough reading to keep me going for hours. But they are not only weighty in content, they are weighty in, well, weight.

The first Sunday on the walk was going to pose an interesting challenge. Of course, I was not going to be able to buy and carry both newspapers. For one thing, I wouldn’t have time to read them! So it would have to be just one. But what to do? Do I wait until the next destination, and run the risk of their being neither of my favourite papers? Or do I buy one at the start of the day, but have to carry it 21 km? The sensible person would do the former. Guess what I did…

Oh, but it was worth it.

Now back to the joint commentary team.

Our room gave us a stunning view overlooking the beach, and at first light the air and the sky simply glowed. It was going to be  great day! After breakfast in the pub’s gloriously-located cafe overlooking the sea, today’s walk took us from Perranporth along the coast to the seaside and surfing Mecca of Newquay. The first part was along the wide sandy beach north of the town, at low tide several hundred metres wide and an excellent way to carry us the first part of the day. Then we were up on the hills again for another day of hillside walking, though this time with fewer cliffs and more gentle slopes. Like yesterday it was a mostly sunny if cool day, and fortunately the wind had dropped quite a lot. Being a Sunday, and close to several settlements, the track was also surprisingly busy. We wondered what it would be like at the height of the season, and shuddered at the thought.

Newquay was the largest town we have been in since leaving St Ives three days ago, and it felt rather odd to be surrounded by so many people. Mind you, it also meant a range of amenities – including a very nice Indian restaurant, recommended by 2 walkers we met in Perranporth, with great views high on the cliff overlooking the beach!

As for those cabbage trees, this icon of New Zealand seem to be ubiquitous throughout Cornwall. We first saw one in the next door garden to our B&B in Penzance, and there was one close by at every B&B since, lurking in the garden or in a tub or somewhere nearby. We joked that perhaps they weren’t real cabbage trees, but alien beings or triffids sent to keep a watch on us. Sssssh… Keep your voice low, there’s one outside as we type this…

Day 5: 20km

Saturday 28 April – Portreath to Perranporth

The day after a long day is always an anxious one, so it was with some trepidation that we set off this morning. We knew it would be shorter (21km) and less strenuous, but how would we cope?

The short answer: very well!

Today was a great day. The weather was kinder, cool but dry and sunny, almost ideal walking weather. Our bodies seemed none the worse for wear. There were a few steep drops and climbs but not as many as yesterday. The scenery remained dramatic and fascinating, mostly walking along the clifftops high above the sea, with the added excitement of hang gliders at one point, hovering above our heads, enjoying the updrafts from the steady breeze. The treeless hillsides were covered in low growth brightened by flowering gorse, yellow primroses and masses of delicate flowers. The various coves and settlements each had their own charm.

Like much of this part of Cornwall, there was still plenty of evidence of the tin mining days. One interesting thing we learned was that many of the ventilation shafts have been secured with conical mesh caps, to make them safe but allow the local bats to use them.

We dropped into several pretty coves, each one with a different character. Our favourite was Trevaunance Cove, pretty as a postcard with a small collection of houses, nestled in a sheltered, tree-filled valley. Unlike yesterday we arrived at out destination, the Seiners Arms pub, by 4pm, time to relax,  and for Peter to have a coffee, and sip a pint of Betty Skogs bitter in the lovely old bar. The Seiners is right by the water, with a great view from our bedroom window right down the beach.

Oh, and the hedgehog? That’s a Chapel Porth specialty, a waffle come with Cornish icecream, topped with clotted cream and smothered in roasted hazelnuts. Yum!

Distance today: 21km

 

Friday 27 April – St Ives to Portreath

Lessons we learned today:

1. 28km is a long way. A LONG way. In miles, it doesn’t sound so bad but in kilometres it looks and is a long way. Even though, unlike yesterday, the route was fairly gentle much of the way, towards the end, we wondered if we’d been a tad over-optimistic scheduling so long a stretch so early in the route.
2. Lesson 2 – weight matters. We now know that 10kg is a tad heavy, so when we get to Bude we’ll be lightening our packs. Those puzzles we brought to help fill in the time? Out! That book Peter foolishly brought along? Out! It’s not as if we have the energy to read anyway – if today is anything to go by, all we want to do when we arrive is to shower, get some dinner, and blob out for an hour before it’s time for sleep.
3. The Cornish scenery is dramatic, even in driving wind and rain. From our wander down through the narrow St Ives streets, out along the coast to Hayle along a wide sandy beach, up the glorious coast to Gwithian and along the sea cliffs to Portreath, it was always dramatic. The stretch in particular to Gwithian – wide long beach, tall sand dunes to our right – reminded us of Muriwai beach on Auckland’s west coast.
4. The Cornish Wind is a living thing, not a wind but a Wind, one that is forever changing its appearance. From St Ives to Hayle it was gentle and playful, but as we walked north it became a ferocious beast of a thing, battering us with wind and rain. Then as we turned east along the coast it changed again, into an octopus, with tentacles that pulled us back, knocked us sideways, and occasionally nudged us forward.
5. No matter how bleak the weather, sun and warmth is just around the corner. We left St Ives in a cold rain; barely an hour later Peter was in shirtsleeves.
6. The redemptive and restorative power of a good Cornish cream tea. We’d had one yesterday but today’s was even better, just as we headed inland from the windswept coast. Jam and clotted cream on a scone – bliss!
7. And finally – the British have finally discovered how to make good coffee! That Cornish cream tea was accompanied by a not-half-bad flat white, and it’s not the first good coffee I’ve had. If you can get a decent flat white in the middle of nowhere, you know civilisation has finally reached the British Isles….

Pendeen to St Ives

The day dawns bright and sunny, and after another hearty breakfast we pack (a process that doesn’t take long), farewell our hosts and walk down a lane and through some fields to regain the South West Coast Path.

Today’s walk starts off similarly to yesterday, the narrow path winding around the rugged coastline. It’s a bit more scrambly and boggy in places, always the risk of an inadvertent footstep into the mud. Wild yellow primroses line the track and in places lots of other flowering plants in inks and purples, their names unknown to us. Further along the track we see two seals (well, in the water, not on the track!) and once on drier ground we see a sizeable adder – Britain’s only poisonous snake – sunning itself by the track.

There are a number of other walkers on the track today. We chat briefly to some and find a few are doing the Path in one-week stages. They all tell us the last 6km stretch into St Ives is quite a scramble with loose boulders after severe winter weather, so we decide to cut inland and follow footpaths through farmland.

Fortuitously, just up the hill we find the charming little village of Zennor. Not only does it have what every self-respecting English village should have – a church, a pub, a historical figure and a pay-and-display carpark – but it has a café serving delicious Cornish cream teas and even serving flat whites! Exactly what the weary, hungry traveller wants by 3pm. Suitably refreshed, we walk the final few kilometres to our next B&B on the outskirts of St Ives, The Old Vicarage.

It’s a very different place to previous ones, a large imposing house complete with lounge and even a room set up as a bar, but just like the first two our host is warm and welcoming. Time for a shower and change, and then down to St Ives for dinner with Angie and Paul in a café overlooking the tiny but exquisite cove of Porthgwiddon, oven-roasted hake for us both rounding off a great second day.

Day 2 – 22km (no kits, cats, sacks or wives)

Day 1 – Wednesday 25 April

Years of dreaming. Months of planning. Weeks of anticipation. And now it’s here.

It starts – as all great adventures must start – with a  hearty breakfast. Just us this morning, the other guests having departed early, so we enjoy the cosy little dining room in peace and quiet. And it starts just the way we wanted, with cereals and juice and on to the cooked breakfast, with its bacon, eggs, mushrooms and hash browns. A gorgeous feast indeed!

Now, we won’t be going on about cooked breakfasts in every blog, but they will undeniably be a source of joy to us – and the best way to carry us through most of each day!

A clear sky gives way to cloud as Angie and Paul pick us up and we go to Land’s End. It’s bleak when we arrive, showers of rain and a bitter wind, so we don’t tarry long by the famous signpost, just long enough for the obligatory photo. And then we’re off.

Angie and Paul walk with us the first part, to the lovely village of Sennen Cove on a glorious stretch of sand. It’s a gentle, well-paved walk, though of course we know that won’t last. A coffee at Sennen Cove and then it’s just us. “Golly*” says Peter. “Gosh*” says Val. (*actual words spoken may differ from the ones written….)

Ahead of us lies 80 days and 1500km.

Bush and forest walks are lovely, but nothing beats a great coastal walk. The scenery is spectacular, the track winding around hillsides from cove to cove, and even the weather brightens up though remaining windy. To our left the wild Atlantic swells crash into the cliffs. To our right lie the largely treeless slopes. Excepting the occasional walker, it’s just us and the elements and it’s absolutely grand!

Towards the end of the day we pass through many remnants of the tin mining industry, walled-off ventilation shafts, derelict chimneys and the remains of stone cottages. We head inland, to our B&B. Now, the crucial decision: which pub to go to for dinner? We choose the one into the wind, so it will blow us back. So the first day ends as it should, with a hearty meal, in a lovely local pub, and a lovely local ale.

Distance today: 16km

 

Tuesday, 24 April

The final part of the lead-up to the start took us from Worthing across to Penzance by train, or rather, three trains – Worthing to Salisbury, change, Salisbury to Exeter, change, and finally on to Penzance.

There’s something quite special about train trips, particularly ones that bear you on to somewhere new, somewhere that’s the start of an adventure. There’s also something quite special about British trains and the train system. Not just that you can book an entire route online, quickly and simple, but the trains themselves. Our favourite is the second leg, Salisbury to Exeter, on a sleek modern and comfortable South Western railway train, gliding smoothly and almost noiselessly through a very rural part of southern England. But they all had their charms, and being able to look out at the ever-changing landscape, completely relaxed, made the eight-hour journey pass by.

We leave Worthing under a cloudy sky and a chill air. As we head west the skies lower, turning to mist and drizzle west of Exeter, a gloomy outlook indeed. We pass through and occasionally stop at places we’ve never heard of but of course have their own rich history and meaning – Totnes, Redruth, St Erth (whoever knew there was a St Erth?) and on to Penzance, end of the line both physically and metaphorically, the train disgorging its passengers into a grey, drizzly and cold late spring afternoon. Odd to think that we are at the very end of England, just a few kilometres between us and the wide Atlantic, just about as far from the centre of Britain as it’s possible to go.

So we walk up the hill in the drizzle, hoping tomorrow will be a better day, and find our B&B, a very nice place called the Pendennis. We meet our good friends Angie and Paul, in the oldest pub in Penzance, the Turks Head, some eight centuries old, a place of low ceilings, nooks and crannies, and great ales and ciders (and yes, we did share a scrumpy!) Just the thing to start our adventure with! Even better, as we walk out, the rain has gone and Venus is shining brightly in a largely cloudless western sky. A good sign? We can only hope.

On 25 April 2018, we start our adventure, one that will take us three months over 1500km. Along the way we’ll walk along some of the UK’s loveliest byways and paths, staying in B&Bs, pubs, youth hostels – and with very accommodating friends and family! For both of us, it’s a walk – and a challenge – we’ve wanted to do for years, and we finally find ourselves at a point in our lives when we can do it. We also hope to raise funds for two charities close to our hearts.

Follow our journey on our blog. You can find out more about our route on the Our Route tab.

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton