Cornwall 2016 - Fowey

Fowey is a very special place.  I've only visited it a couple of times but I have loved both those visits. The name Fowey, is pronounced to rhyme with joy, and appropriately that's what William, Maureen, Jerry and I had the afternoon we spent in Fowey - a joy filled time.

For me Fowey is all about the waterfront.  There's so much to look at.  The boats bobbing about, the wooded hillside and the homes peppering the far side.  What a view those home owners have every day!

Picturesque to say the least.

This is the town side, where we spent the afternoon wandering around, in and out of the shops and up and down the little tight streets.  After which thirst drove us to one of those waterfront pubs...

... where we quenched our thirst ...

... enjoyed the tranquil view and rested for a while as twilight fell.

Time was marching on by now and we needed to attack the steep hills back to the car park.

It was uphill all the way.

This picture makes me smile.  Jerry and Billy are manfully soldiering on while Maureen, down there at the bottom, hand on  hip, takes a breather. :-)  It was definitely a good old slog back up those hills!

But once at the top there were more fantastic views to reward our efforts.

Twilight and autumn colours made memories of this day so special.  Oh, and the fact that we got well and truly lost between Polperro and Fowey.  That is far too long a story to go into but the four of us remember it well I'm sure!

Maureen takes a last lingering look over...

..this incredibly beautiful Cornish scenery and the setting sun.

The sky was ablaze with colour as we arrived at the car park.  A fitting close to a long and happy day spent in Polperro and Fowey.

Before the day was truly over, back at the cottage there was time for Rummikub, nibbles and a tipple or two before we climbed the wooden hill to bed.

Cornwall 2016 - Polperro

Continuing with posts from our Cornish holiday here are a few pictures from pretty Polperro.

More of those amazingly narrow streets.

William and I watched one of those Escape to the Country programmes a night or two ago and Polperro featured on it.  We love those programmes but it seems that every Tom, Dick and Harry wants to live in Cornwall or Devon.  Now the southwest of England is indeed beautiful but the UK is full of beautiful places so I really wish the programme makers would feature more of the rest of the UK more often. I live in hope.

Polperro's harbour is so picturesque with loads of brilliant-white painted houses clinging to the hillsides.

This little corner of Polperro looks kind of continental to me.  I think the old chap walking up the lane leaning on his cane and wearing a beret type hat looks French or Italian?

Another view of the harbour from the other side of the harbour walls.

Maureen and I climbed up some steps away from the harbour and were rewarded with maginificent views of the coastline. How are these for rock pools?

It's hard  not to take pictures in places like this.  Every which way you look is a scene begging for a snap or two.

Like this little trio of hungry, thirsty tourists - I couldn't help but snap a picture of them.  As I remember it though we didn't actually dine here.  Nobody found anything of interest on the menu.  I wasn't  bothered about the menu I just wanted the table with a view.  A view of the harbour which was right in front of us. However I was a minority of one.  The majority vote was to find somewhere else to eat and that's exactly what we did, further up the village.  It wasn't a problem, these little villages are full of places to eat.

The day didn't end in Polperro.  From here we made our way to Fowey, in a very roundabout way that is. We got lost and saw most of the rest of Cornwall before we drove into Fowey!

Cornwall 2016 - Port Isaac

One of the places high on the list of places to visit for Maureen and Jerry, Jerry probably more than Maureen, was Port Isaac.  Port Isaac being the location for television's Doc Martin series and Doc Martin is one of their favourite programmes.  So, when Port Isaac was only fifteen minutes away from where we were staying there was no reason not to pop over and take a look.  

The car park for Port Isaac is way up on the cliff tops and on the walk down to the village magnificent views of the coast line, like this one, immediately come into view and just demand that you stand and marvel at such natural beauty.

Walking on down to the village it's hard not to stop and marvel too at all the immaculately kept, higgledy piggledy cottages.

Making our way down to the village centre we detoured up, down, around, in and between the side streets.

Seeing peculiar shaped houses like this one.  Attractive, but peculiar all the same.

We were able to look down across the rooftops, all cheek by jowl with their neighbours.  Town planning, regulations and bye-laws obviously weren't an issue when this town came into being.

Finally arriving in the village centre at the Lifeboat Station.  All lifeboatmen and women in the UK are volunteers.  Their main aim is to save lives at sea.  Everything they do, which includes putting their own lives at risk, is done out of the goodness of their hearts and not to pad out bank balances.  The Royal National Lifeboat Institute is a charity run on donations only with no help from the government.  It''s incredible isn't it that such an amazing organisation is self supporting?  Follow the link to read more about them.

From the lifeboat station it's just a short walk uphill to Fern Cottage which may be better known to lovers of Doc Martin  as Dr Ellingham's surgery.   Here Jerry is taking a look in the window.  It was okay, there was nobody at home.  The cottage is a holiday let and there's an information notice in the window for people to read.

Now Billy is playing "nosy parker" while Jerry admires the view across the bay in front of the house.  He's seen that house and view so many times on the television screen in his living room thousands of miles away on the other side of the Atlantic and now here he is standing right in front of it. Unreal, eh?

Tourists being tourists.  After all, that's what holidays are all about.

And this is the view in front of Fern Cottage, usually minus this happy pair of tourists.

You can imagine after all that wandering up hill and down dale through this lovely little Cornish village it was only fitting that we stopped in a cafe, just a couple of houses down from Fern Cottage, for a Cornish Cream Tea and a rest.

After which it was time to wander back up those hills and spy more quaint cottages along the way.

And step out of the way of the odd car bravely driving through the narrowest of roads!

A last look at the harbour as we climb higher up away from the village centre to the cliff top car park. 

Now this house really is something special.  I love its perfect symmetry.   See the plantation shutters in the downstairs windows?  William has an obsession with them at the minute.  He points them out everywhere we go!

One last snap before we reached the car park.  I couldn't resist this one with the seagull proudly sitting there.

The day wasn't over yet though.  We called in at Padstow for fish and chips from Chip Ahoy chippy ...

.. and ate them sitting on a bench overlooking the quiet and peaceful harbour.  October, with its lack of crowds, is definitely a good time to visit this very popular corner of England.

Eating fish and chips makes you thirsty so we popped into The London Inn again for a cold drink and a relaxing hour or so to finish off the day. 

Nighttime had fallen while we were snug in the pub and there was a chill in the air now.  Another photo ..

... or two and it was back to the ranch to batten down the hatches, while the night away with a game of Rummikub, a drink or two and intermittently watch the news which consisted mainly of the American Election palaver.  It wasn't yet certain who was going to be king or queen of the White House but one thing was certain - we four had had a brilliant day!

Cornwall 2016 - Newquay

Five million tourists visit Cornwall each year and it's not hard to understand why.  I'm sure that the majority of those tourists visit in the summer months but believe me, autumn in Cornwall is magical too.

October was a busy, in a really good busy way, month here in my world.  My sister and her husband came over from Arkansas for a three week visit.  While they were he we managed to take them on not one, but two trips. The first being to Cornwall where we stayed in my lovely cousin Sylvia and her husband Andy's gorgeous quaint little cottage in Wadebridge near Padstow.  The second was up to Silverdale in Cumbria.

Maureen and Jerry arrived here early on Thursday morning 13th October and early the following Sunday morning the four of us piled into our loaded car and set of for the 325 or so mile journey.   It wasn't a bad journey either.  No major roadworks or incidents, so different from the same journey in the summer months.

Monday, we had decided we would visit Newquay.  It was lunchtime when we got there so what better lunch to have than a Cornish pasty. A pasty shop was easily found and we consumed the said pasties on the hoof.  They were good too!

Walking down the main stretch to the beach we wandered in and out of a couple of shops. This one in particular was worth browsing.  Maureen and I each bought ten greetings cards for £7.  Really good quality ones and a bargain for sure.  All bright and cheerful.  They do online sales at https://www.whistlefish.com/  

Of course a walk on Towan Beach was essential.   

The obligatory photo of the house on  the rock reached via a suspension beach.  Imagine having to regularly carry all your shopping over that bridge.  I wonder do the local supermarkets offer click and collect for these homeowners?  I would think not.

What a beautiful day it was.  And what a place to stop for coffee and admire the view!

Our day had been planned out and driving back home via the coast road was part of that plan.  The last time we had driven along this road, which was in 2011, our eyes ogled this picturesque wide sweeping bay but then we had merely driven right past it!  But this time I wanted to stop and experience the full splendour of Watergate Bay.

Watergate Bay is wonderful.  Even on a wild and windy day like the day we stopped there for an hour or so it was wonderful.  The tide was out quite some distance which meant we could walk out on the sands...

... and take in the dramatic coastline.  Spectacular!

Turning back we took shelter under the rugged cliffs and looked for those special stones and shells that somehow just find their way into your pockets.

One for the album.  Isn't that stone gorgeous?  We didn't hang about near the cliffs for too long.  It looked like there had been a fair bit of cliff crumbling to me and you never know when the next one might be.

Yep, lots of people out there surfing and bodyboarding even though it was mid-October.  

Pressing on we drove further up the coast taking in eye catching glimpses of blue sea at nearly every bend in the road.  

Newquay was Maureen's old stomping ground having worked there in her heyday when she was a single footloose and fancy free young woman.  So this day was a bit special for her.  A trip down Memory Lane for sure.  Memories of the summer she had spent working with a dear friend and of the friends she had made came flooding back to her.

In 2011 we had brought Maureen and Jerry here to Bedruthan Steps Hotel where Maureen had been a receptionist for the summer but that time we just wandered through the hotel while Maureen gave us a running commentary on the fun she had had during her summer working there.

Not this time.  As we wandered into the reception area Jerry approached the desk and told the the receptionists that his wife had had their job in the late 60s.  They were so cheerful, smiley, surprised and interested in the story that it was only a few minutes before a lady came out of the office opposite and said she thought she knew Maureen from somewhere.  It turned out the lady, Debbie, was the owner's daughter and had been a ten year old girl when Maureen worked there.  Her mother, the owner whom Maureen remembered well, was alive and kicking and living down the road.  Well, between them they must've remembered every member of staff from that time!  Some of them had returned year after year and Debbie was able to update Maureen on the whereabouts of most of them.  

How incredible it was that somebody who knew Maureen and the people she had known all those years ago and could reminisce with her about those happy days was on duty in the hotel on the day we visitied!  Truly amazing.  After their long animated chat we all toured the hotel.  A rather splendid upmarket hotel it is too.

Rooms with a view.

This view.

Leaving Bedruthan Steps behind we headed for home but not before we made a stop at Harlyn Bay.

Twilight and people still out there in the water!  Must be a hardy lot those surfer types.

William, Jerry and Maureen.  Up on a sandbank enjoying uninterrupted views of that beautiful bay and coastline.  You can see by their clothes that the wind was still blowing.

Nearly home now but one more stop.  This time in The London Inn, Padstow for a welcome drink and a chat about the happy day's happenings. 

Until next time,