Sunday 18th to Thursday 22nd July 2010.
We were to head to Cornwall and first night’s accommodation was booked at a place named Saltash, to the west of Plymouth. Did we go directly there or did we take the Treseder route?
We did not arrive until after 9pm because of the detours that we took.
The first visit was to Stonehenge, a place I thought I’d never see. The site is sandwiched between the Y intersection of 2 roads and consequently there is the constant traffic noise that invades the place. It is also roped off so that you cannot move between the stones, which given the predilection of some of today’s youth to spray paint everything in sight or carve their names for posterity, is a good thing. However, the ropes do detract from the ambience of the site and tend to make it somewhat artificial.
Then we travelled some more and started our ruined castle tour – the first of five that we saw in 4 days in Cornwall and Wales – Old Waldour Castle near Salisbury being the first. Other sites we visited included Tintagel Castle near Tintagel, Pendennis Castle near Falmouth, Dartmouth Castle near Dartmouth and Cardiff Castle in Cardiff. All the sites were in varying degrees of decay, with Pendennis being in good condition. Tintagel was almost all ruins and it was raining with strong winds blowing off the Atlantic while we were there.
Tintagel was also where we tried our authentic Cornish pasty - and let me tell you that they are something else – big chunks of vegetables and BEEF – not mince. An aussie pasty does not hold a candle to these things – and they are big!
Murray has relatives in Cornwall so we visited them as well – one owns a pub at a place named St Agnes where we spent a few hours and we had dinner at another cousin’s home on Wednesday night. The Cornish people are very hospitable and they were interested to hear that their summer is somewhat similar to our winter – I can’t imagine what their winter is like. It is cool and it seems to rain a lot.
We also visited a place named Mousehole, which was where Michelle’s father came from – and it was a place that immediately reminded us of the Cinque Terra without the colours of the buildings. Why anybody would want to leave there and come to Australia is beyond us.....
The streets were also very, very narrow – one car at a time. In order to get photos, Murray had to stop the car in the street whilst I clicked away, much to the annoyance of the drivers who had to wait for me to finish.
We also experienced the delight of travelling down those quaint English lanes wide enough for one car only – fortunately we only had to reverse back once – on every other occasion the other vehicle did the reversing. The hedges and the canopy of trees forming tunnels over the road were spectacular and memorable. The tractors that plied the lanes were also memorable, but not in a positive sense as they were not as fast as a car.
Gloria and Eily spent the nights giving their livers a workout after a hard day’s touring – and that was after dinner and wines or spirits with the meal. We had lunches and dinners at little country pubs, where I experienced ‘warm’ English beer. The beer is not chilled to the degree that Australian beers are, but they are cold. Apparently the kegs sit in a dark cool cellar and so the beer is served at cellar temperature and is not refrigerated. Nevertheless, it is very drinkable......
We spent Wednesday night in Cardiff (after a long drive from Cornwall and didn't arrive there untill 12.30 am)and visited the castle in the morning before heading back to Birstall.
We head to London for a day then we are off to France for a look around for a few days
Enjoy work !
