Yesterday I drove from Hawarden (I’d spent the night at Gladstone’s Library again) down to visit my friend in south Wales. It’s long, but beautiful, journey mostly along minor A roads. After the early morning mists lifted (around Welshpool) the sun came out. Occasionally my route was diverted onto minor roads through unknown (to me) villages and hamlets and with marvellous views of distant mountains.
A couple of years ago I read the late Helen Dunmore’s fictional account of the time D.H.Lawrence and his wife Frieda spent in Cornwall during the First World War. “Zennor in Darkness“. Thus I was intrigued to visit this village : to walk to Zennor Head and back and take in the cottages at Lower Tregerthen both a mile or so out of the village in different directions. The bus service in winter runs roughly every three hours but I found arriving at 12.08 and leaving at 14.52 gave me sufficient time to do both walks there and back; to visit the pub The Tinners Arms for fresh crab sandwiches and local apple cider and to call in at the church to see the famous mermaid carving which I had also read about.
Along the way from Botallack to Levant there were still many signs of the former mining industry but also I admired the many beautiful walls filled with wild flowers along the way.
Right at the very end of Cornwall, just to the north of Lands End, lies The Tin Coast a seven mile stretch of coast with a rich mining history. It’s part of the Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape, inscribed in 2006, UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Whilst at Penzance, staying at The Second Floor Flat at The Egyptian House on Chapel Street, I chose to read from the Library Lucinda Lambton’s ‘An Album of Curious Houses’ . I wasn’t surprised to see The Egyptian House featured. It’s certainly a curiosity amongst the other buildings of Chapel Street.
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The next day, before heading off on the train to Penzance, I spent the morning walking round the bay again. I had been intrigued by a small white building, on what turned out to be a headland, on the opposite side of the bay.
You can just about see it on the green hump in the middle of the picture
From the moment I first arrived in Newquay two Sundays ago I was mesmerised by the view. I’d booked a week’s stay in Penzance (Monday to Monday) but flew down from Leeds on the Sunday before staying the night at Fistral Beach. I’d never visited Newquay before. I certainly saw it at its best with this beautiful weather. I stayed overnight again the following Monday – same place, same views. On both occasions my timings meant that I had over 24 hours for each stay and plenty of time to investigate the cliff paths and seafoods and ice creams on offer.
It’s my last day here in the Alps. I fly home tomorrow. I spent another day walking on prepared snowy paths in Central Switzerland. I joined my friend Kathrin on the train from Meiringen and we travelled just over the Brünig Pass to the village of Lungern where I worked in the hotel for the summer of 1975. The family I worked for at the Hotel Rössli became great friends of ours and the niece and her family that visited me on Sunday. The hotel is long gone and has been replaced, sadly, by a bank branch. The train journey took just over twenty minutes and we soon arrived at Lungern station. After a twenty minute walk we were at the totally new cable car station, only opened last year.
A walk along the Hasliberger Dorfweg (Hasliberg village trail) is like a 1960s geography lesson brought to life. Just as I did yesterday, I took the crowded cable car from Meiringen/Alpbach to Reuti at one end of the trail. In school we learnt how to draw a Swiss chalet and the practicality of the design. We learned about transhumance and how self-sufficient each farm needed to be and about diversification. In physical geography we studied glaciers and valley shapes and the importance of communication routes. The evidence is all to be found on this walk.
Hooray! This morning the rain had stopped and the sun came out and it was time to head up, up, up to the nearest peak and make my way back down quite a bit of it on foot.
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