Five Senses or 5-4-3-2-1

Posted on 7 September 2026 by sheg4184

‘Stories begin with noticing.’ ~With apologies to John Roberts

It is early morning, and even the birds are silent. A faint breeze whispers around the tiled chimney stacks and fills the pale linen curtain like a sail. I am perched at a small, square, slatted table, on a walled balcony at the very top of the house. I am a wedge-tailed eagle on her eyrie, or Bunyip Bluegum in his treehouse among the eucalypts. From this rooftop perspective, I will try, in the manner of John Roberts to focus on my senses, starting with five things I see.

I see the gritty, white drive wending its way through fields burnt to an ash-blonde, straw-dry, fire risk and a mixed bag of raggle-taggle trees. Beyond the tree line to my left, a pink and orange orb rising swiftly above the hill, casting shadows on a craggy mountain range – the majestical Apennines – to the west. (So, I guess I’m facing South.)

A broad, green pool lies below me, lucent and still, calling to me, tempting me to don my bathers and take an early morning dip before the sun begins to glare off the water and heat the paving stones to blistering point. But I will resist and attempt to focus, to stay captive in the moment.

Through a small window behind me, framed thickly in dark wood, I have a camera-lens view across a landscape of steep but rolling hills, reminiscent of the opening scenes of Kenneth Branagh’s classic, Much Ado About Nothing. I am staying in a beautiful old Italian farmhouse atop a hill, not in Tuscany, but somewhere in the province of Terino, Abruzzo, on the Adriatic coast.

Before me, the curved terracotta tiles, ancient Roman style, hug the roof, bleached only slightly by centuries of abruzzese sun. Many are cracked and broken. I have seen several on the ground below, swept into a pile at a far corner of the building – so heaven knows if the roof will survive the autumn rains. Maybe buckets will be needed to catch the drips seeping through the ceilings.

Like John, I look at my computer screen balanced precariously on this fragile, collapsible table. The screen is gradually filling with words but not as fluently as if I had a pen and paper – a pen always seems to help my thoughts flow more fluently from imagination to page – but I can’t remember where I left it. Probably in the kitchen, down a perilous flight of stairs wither I will not venture in this half-light, for fear of tripping-and-toppling with a crash and a thump to the bottom.

Now, four things I can hear.

The distant thrum of traffic although there’s no sign of a road. There must be a motorway tucked into the valley, commuters heading at speed for Pescara or Bologna. At home, there would be no murmuration of traffic. Instead, the raucous clatter of our voluble Australian parrots heralding the new day and, if I’m lucky, the throaty, rolling gurgle of a magpie serenading the sun.

From my bird’s eye view, I hear the faint chirrup of voices from the terrace, as two of my companions head out for an early morning walk, crossing the terrace, past the pool and along the dusty drive to the road, reminiscent of that childhood picture book, Rosie’s walk: around the haystack, past the beehives, behind the shed. Hopefully, they won’t get lost today, or get eaten by a fox …

I hear the burr of some distant electric tool, and flinch at the disturbance. Is it a vacuum cleaner? A leaf blower? A saw? It’s obviously an early start to beat the heat. Our neighbour at home loves his leaf blower – luckily for us, or we would soon drown in gum leaves – but he wouldn’t start at daybreak!

The sound of church bells, surprisingly melodic, drift over the hill, calling the Catholics to a morning service. The rhythm is almost hypnotic, but there is a slightly mechanical twang – real bells or a recording? Apparently, there are three churches in the village at the bottom of the hill, with poetic names like Chiesa del Cimitero, Chiesa di Maria Santissima Regina della famiglia, Santuario di Santa Maria in Herulis.

[As John says, ‘I am no longer merely grounded in the present moment, I am inventing, extrapolating, wondering. The senses are not passive; they are gateways.’] My next gateway then, is smell.

The air is dusty but fresh, after days of stultifying heat, and the scent of rain on dusty ground is in the air, signalling the end of summer at last. Although, oddly, the sky has been swept clean of a single wisp of cloud. So, perhaps it is rather a lingering smell of smoke, and I am simply imagining that rain-on-hot-earth scent – wishful thinking?

Now, the aroma of coffee is floating up the stairs and through the window like that old Bisto add, calling the children home with the whiff of gravy. It is a familiar aroma that will wake me from dreams if my husband rises first, creeping quietly to the kitchen, surprisingly soft-footed for his height and shoe size.

I can just discern a waft of cheap bleach that has been drifting through the house since we arrived, following me along the narrow passages and up the wobbly staircase, attempting to mask the foetid stench of old drains that makes me want to hold my breath and race outside. I long, briefly, for the silky, slightly salty scent that drifts off the sea at home; a similar ancient landscape, dry and dusty, dotted with olive trees, but thousands of miles southeast of here, across sea and ocean, hills & mountains, deserts & jungle.

Two thing I can feel: a cool breath of wind sweeping across my cheeks like light kisses, dancing through wisps of hair, reminding me that I need to wash it this morning, stiff as it is from the saltwater pool into which I plunged yesterday, time and again, to clear my head, groggy from the heat.

Like Mr. Roberts, the second thing I feel is the chair beneath me. And like his, this one is not very comfortable. It is an old wooden chair, solid and well built, with a broad wooden seat, but hard and unforgiving. After only fifteen minutes – compared with his hour – I am distracted by the nagging ache in my lower back, and acknowledge my terrible posture, hunched over my computer, my shoulders in their habitual creep up to my ears, not grounding at all, John, but disturbing my solitude and my stream-of-consciousness with a niggling pain. I try to pull my shoulders down, ease my back, stir, shift position, but it all seems to get worse rather than better. Bugger it. Time to follow the scent of coffee to the kitchen…

Which leads me straight to that final step: one thing I want. Also, that final sense: taste. The answer to both is coffee. I know it won’t be in my favourite morning mug, imprinted with a Hannah Dale highland cow, which has become a ridiculous but happy ritual when I am home. And I will have to discern from the small print whether it is fresh milk or UHT, so common here in Italy, but designed to ruin my morning coffee and dispel my humour in a flash of cloying, unnatural flavour. Luckily, our English hosts must be aware of my penchant for ‘proper’ milk – or prefer it themselves – and keep us well stocked. The coffee machine had a glitch yesterday morning, which is no drama, as there are three Italian coffee pots at the back of the cupboard. These days, we usually travel with our own caffettiera, as there is rarely such a thing in the homes of friends or the Airbnbs that we frequent. Illy coffee perhaps, now I am in Italy, or something like it. Hopefully.

Perhaps I will risk the staircase to find a mug of coffee at last. Then I can carry it out to the terrace and sit by the pool, where I can sip on my bitter tongue-curling coffee, with only a dash of milk, providing the first taste sensation of the day. And I miss – for just a moment – my morning routine for making a pot of coffee: filling the lower chamber of the Mokha pot with water, just to the pressure valve; spooning the ground coffee into the basket, flattening it a little, adding half a teaspoon more, inevitably leaving a miniscule trail of fine coffee grains on the counter. As it boils on the gas stove, I heat the milk, then froth it manually, till it pours like cream, and smile to remember my father-in-law, faking horror at my inability to drink it black. Every time. For almost forty years….

*With thanks to Booking.com for the photograph.

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Two Tree Island & Beyond

Posted on 2 September 2026 by sheg4184

As we start our descent over Kent, it is obvious that England has been scalded by summer sun this year and the countryside below is looking remarkably like Australia, the lawns and fields burnt to a yellowy-beige stubble. Heading east from Gatwick, the windscreen is deluged in much-needed rain, but without its usual lush green summer coat, the world simply looks bedraggled. Through pouring rain and traffic jams and the Dartford tunnel, we eventually emerge into Essex, where the cloudburst has cleared and the sky boasts a few patches of exuberant blue.

Essex is a low-lying county to the east of London, with an extensive stretch of coastline that is exceptionally tidal – mud flats and salt marsh are regularly submerged in sea from the English Channel that races up the Thames estuary at high tide and drops 4.5 meters (or 14 feet) at low tide.

It is the last Bank Holiday Monday of the year, possibly the last day of summer, and the sky has transformed from gunmetal grey to a pale azure blue. We are strolling west along the coastal path towards Canvey Island and Hadleigh Castle, a medieval ruin once built by Edward III to protect England during the Hundred Years War. Behind us, the world’s longest jetty at Southend-on-Sea stretches almost a mile and a half out across the sand to the deeper water of the Thames, to play tippy-go with the ships that are heading into the London Docks. On shore, Adventure Island hails us with the shrieks and screams of the kids on the hair-raising rides that swoop and spin, while the Ferris wheel turns ponderously, smiling indulgently upon its wayward guests.

At Leigh-on-Sea, a cobbled street runs between the river and the train line, the c2c – or city to coast – that takes commuters from Shoeburyness to Fenchurch Street Station and home again. I count three, four, five pubs in a row, all bursting with holidaymakers and locals, where the strong aroma of frying seafood makes my nostrils twitch.  

Further west, a narrow road bridge crosses the mud flats and marsh onto a small, flat expanse of scrub. From the bridge we spot a converted Dutch barge that sits squat and funerial in the mud, waiting for the tide to come in and resurrect it. A few moments later – or so it seems – it is bobbing gently on rippling corduroy waves, tugging a little at its mooring ropes, keen to flee to the sea.

Two Tree Island is over six hundred acres of land that was reclaimed from the Thames Estuary in the eighteenth century, for grazing cattle and sheep. A sewage works was planted here in the early twentieth century, and the island was later used for landfill. These days, it has been reclaimed as a nature reserve the by Essex Wildlife Trust and has become a terrific spot for birdwatchers. We pass a man with a cat on a lead, then a selection of more conventional dog walkers. Hedgerows of rosehips, hawthorn and blackthorn covered in berries like blue and red confetti line the path, to be joined by a young oak, a mulberry tree and a selection of gnarly wild apple trees. Blackberry bushes, abundant with ripening fruit, offer a feast of autumnal foraging. On the eastern tip of the island, a pillbox, crumbly and wrinkled, like the old men in Dad’s Army, inspire a vague memory of a bygone war.

We wander along an asparagus-green lagoon edged with reeds and dotted with wild ducks and small, black headed gulls, till we reach the southern side of the island, where derelict rowboats, adrift on dreams, rust and rot and loll drunkenly on the mud, their ropes green with algae. The clink-clink-clink of wires against the masts of a dozen sailing boats set a crazy beat to our steps, as a gusty breeze disperses the heat and the wispy clouds. We stroll back to Leigh-on-Sea on weary feet and discover a fabulous cockle chowder served up in a deep and crusty bread-bowl with an icy pint of Aspell’s cyder – older than Adelaide – to make our toes curl with joy.

****

A new day, a new beach, this one on the east coast of Italy. Pescara is a city in Abruzzo that was heavily bombed towards the end of World War II and rebuilt with urban efficiency, but without much charm or character. However, the cerulean sky is generously stitched with flimsy contrails, and the calm water stretches west across the Adriatic to Croatia, while Roma lies over the Apennines to the east. For miles along the coast in both directions, the long, flat, sandy beach is arranged like graph paper with row upon row of neatly measured umbrellas, just like Normanville isn’t.

I have a hotel room with high ceilings and deep blue floor tiles overlooking the beach, and a neighbourhood awash with seafood restaurants and bistros, cafeterias and pizzerias. A few palms, oleander bushes and heat-struck trees offer a suggestion of shade, but the gentle sea breeze cools the air more effectively. Young drivers – mostly of the male variety – cruise along the esplanade with radios blaring, reminiscent of the Essex lads at Southend-on-Sea, but otherwise there is little resemblance between these two worlds. There is an urgency to Southend that is missing in this laissez-faire Mediterranean town, where there are so many more weeks of hot sun and a much broader expanse of sand on which to soak up its rays. Here, in Italy, lunch is a long, slow progression from aperitivo, primo and secondo, to a scoop of pistachio gelato, a tiny espresso laced with brown sugar, and maybe, just maybe a digestivo to finish up. Then, only mad dogs and Englishmen would resist the call of a cool, shuttered room and crisp white sheets for an afternoon siesta. My shoulders have dropped, and my head is drooping. Time to find my pillow…

*With thanks to the One & Only for letting me use his photo.

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“We’re Going to the Zoo”

Posted on 23 August 2026 by sheg4184

A small person in our family turned four this week, and the excitement has been building for weeks. An early birthday present had already combined her favourite colour (yellow) with her favourite footwear (crocs) and we also got to take her on a special outing while her parents were working. The One & Only recently discovered Urimbirra Wildlife Park, on the outskirts of Victor Harbor. It turned out to be a real winner.

Urimbirra is a private, family-run wildlife park in the Hindmarsh Valley with all you could want of native Australian animals, birds and reptiles, as well as a few blow-ins like the Golden Pheasant of western China and the Blue and the South American Gold Macaw.

Open every day of the year from 10am, there are forty acres of exhibits, giant eucalypts, billabongs and open parkland, with plenty of space for picnics and easy parking. (After weeks in Cornwall, I am suddenly very aware of the ‘easy parking’ part!) It mightn’t be as large as some of the more well-known animal parks, such as Monarto or Cleland Reserve, but it was the perfect size for Miss Four, with plenty to keep her busy for two or three hours. And neither she nor the animals were overwhelmed by too many visitors.

Entry fees were also incredibly reasonable. Apparently, there is a small café, but we had packed snacks for the journey, so will save that experience for next time. We also grabbed a couple of bags of nibbles for the kangaroos on our way through reception and were almost instantly greeted by some enthusiastic kangaroos eager to see what we had in our pockets. There were also a number of joeys, and the mothers seemed more than happy for us to inspect them close up – for a small fee in the shape of a handful of pellets!

Urimbirra is an Aboriginal word meaning ‘to take care of’, and these animals are certainly well looked after. I am not normally mad about seeing animals or birds in cages, but these guys looked pretty comfortable with the set up. The aviaries are terrific, and the huge black cockatoos came right up for a nose-to-beak chat – although given the strength of those beaks and claws, I was happy to have a strong mesh fence between us. We see these fellas in the trees around our garden, but it was the first time we had ever been able to get so close, and they really do have the most beautiful plumage, every jet-black feather delineated in a fine edging of golden wattle. Amusingly, a flock of bossy, brightly coloured lorikeets had slipped through the wire to take advantage of a free feed, while a sulphur crested cocky called out ‘hello, hello’ like a telephone operator on repeat. Time to teach him a new word methinks.

Further on we reached a walk-through aviary where we were dive-bombed by a bunch of lorikeets – full-time residents, these ones – who raced round the cage at impressive speeds. A number of people flinched from a close encounter with these kamikaze rainbows skimming over their heads, but not one actually collided with us. At a safer distance, a family of glossy ibis – Australia’s smallest – showed off beautifully bronze feathers that glimmered like Thai silk. Admittedly Miss Four was a bit nervous of those long, hooked beaks, but they were too shy to approach, so there was nothing to fear.

Back outside, the wallabies and kangaroos were hovering for an introduction, and we stopped again for a chat, before edging past to meet the koalas. Two were brought out for our inspection, but they were far more interested in their morning tea than us – lush branches of gum leaves were understandably far more appealing than we were. Still, it provided a free photo opportunity, even if they refused to smile for the cameras.

The park has a number of wombats, too. As largely nocturnal animals, they were all curled up, snoring in their dens, but there are windows on one side where you can inspect these sleeping bolsters without bothering them. They are surprisingly large at such close quarters.

In one sunny corner of the park is the reptile house, and apparently there is a snake handling session in the afternoon. However, we were happy, Harry Potter style, to enjoy them through the glass while they (mostly) slept in a tight coil beneath a heat lamp on this cool winter morning, although one black-headed fellow looked quite keen to come out for a ‘meet-and-greet’ – or did he mean a ‘meet-and eat?’ The lizards, too, had crawled up logs to get as close as possible to the heat lamps in search of a winter tan, which was great for us, as it meant we could see them more clearly. This led to long discussions about the differences between a Blue-tongue lizards and water dragons.

Two young emus were pacing the perimeter fence of their enclosure, and initially I was wary of those long necks and beaks, but apparently their strong legs and sharp-clawed toes can be far more bothersome, and in fact they, too, were just looking for snacks. Meanwhile the wood ducks wandered in and out through the gap at the bottom of the fence. We have got rather fond of these pretty little native ducks lately, as they have developed a penchant for gathering on and around our pool for social gatherings.

Apparently there are echidnas to be seen, too, but they were wisely hibernating until the weather warms up a tad. And there were still plenty of other animals to see.

So, what have I missed? Oh yes, the predators. A pair of lean but healthy-looking dingoes who came up to inspect us at close quarters before dashing off to chase a couple of wild ducks who wisely didn’t hang around to be introduced. The small, freshwater crocodiles and their neighbours – two hefty seawater crocs – were totally disinterested in engaging with their visitors but baked quietly in a gentle winter sun and enjoyed a mid-morning nap.

A stone’s throw from these disingenuously docile meat-eaters is the farmyard, where we had a lovely time feeding the last of our kangaroo pellets to a large collection of very amenable Guinea-pigs and cooing over a dozen baby chickens dizzily skiddering around their enclosure.

At the far end of the park, we found an area fenced off from the kangaroos, who otherwise roam freely, where only the birds disturb the ancient gums once used as canoe and shield trees by the The Ramindjeri People who are the traditional owners of this southern end of the Fleurieu Peninsula.

So, take a picnic and a couple of small people for a delightful day out among our very special Australian wildlife. Urimbirra really is a hidden gem.And I have only mentioned a handful of the birds, animals and reptiles we saw there…

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‘A Little Guitar’

Posted on 26 July 2026 by sheg4184

My favourite road on the Fleurieu Peninsula runs for twenty miles, through gumtrees and farmland, from Yankalilla to Victor Harbor. On a drizzly evening earlier this month, I travelled with friends down the Inman Valley Road to Victor Harbor for an early dinner and a movie night.

The Victa Cinema first opened in the spring of 1923 as the Victor Theatre. Destroyed by fire in 1934, it was subsequently rebuilt in the Art Deco style from designs by Adelaide architect Kenneth Milne. It was also substantially enlarged, and ever since, it has been a popular regional cinema that is now heritage-listed. We don’t get over there often, but the One & Only and I love this attractive local cinema with its friendly staff, comfortable seats, acres of legroom, and old-fashioned charm.

So, I must tell you about the movie we saw last week. ‘A Boy Called Sailboat’ is a beautiful film written and directed by Cameron Nugent and filmed in Silver City, New Mexico. Cameron came along to this special showing of his movie and took time to talk with the audience about how it came about.

The story is loosely based on a piece he wrote when still at school, although he re-located it from Melbourne to New Mexico. (Oddly enough, the landscape could just as easily have been northern South Australia.) It follows the young son of a dirt-poor Hispanic family, who have inexplicably nicknamed him Sailboat, probably due to an early obsession with boats, despite living so far from the sea.

This is Nugent’s debut as a director, and his movie is a delight. Quirky and whimsical, the story is a simple one: young Sailboat finds a ukelele in a junk pile and teaches himself to play on his ‘little guitar’. Eventually, he makes up a special song for his grandmother, who is lying ill in hospital. The twist? The audience never actually hears the song. Instead, we watch the reactions of his listeners, which suggest he has uncovered a very special talent for music, and writing heart-felt lyrics that strike a deep chord with all who hear it.

Nugent told us that, after testing numerous child actors for the three main roles (Sailboat, his best friend Petee, and his wannabe girlfriend, Mandy) he eventually resorted to using kids from the local school. They are all superbly unselfconscious and appealingly unsophisticated.

The original score was written and performed by the Armenian Australian classical guitarists, Slava and Leonard Grigoryan, known professionally as the Grigoryan Brothers, who actually performed live for this event, which made the whole experience extra-special.

‘A Boy Called Sailboat’ is a lovely family movie that moves along gently. Set in a drought-ridden and economically depressed part of southwest America, Sailboat and his parents live in a lopsided, ramshackle cabin in the desert. Sailboat (Julian Atocani Sánchez) is about eight years old , so named because, despite living hundreds of miles from the sea, he has a passion for boats, which he draws incessantly and pins up on his wall. His tattoed father, José (Noel Gugliemi) – who is as soft as butter despite his mafia-like appearance – is likewise mad about horses, which he endlessly paints by numbers at the kitchen table, while his wife Meyo (Elizabeth De Razzo) spends her days cooking meatballs and stepping gently so as not to cause the house to collapse. Sailboat, meanwhile, creates a song on his ‘little guitar’ for his beloved ‘Abuela’ so wonderful that anyone who hears it can’t stop weeping. The song brings hope and joy to the entire town, a message to the world about the magic of good music that never grows tired.

The film won Best Feature at the 2018 San Diego International Film. It is one that I will definitely be watching again. If only for those delightful moments of humour: Jose’s car with no back doors; Meyo’s ever expanding pots of meatballs; Mandy’s eccentric outfits; Petees eyedrops; Sailboat’s fascinating with a boat ‘for sail’ in the middle of the desert…

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It’s a Wrap!

Posted on 21 June 2026 by sheg4184

The Final Lap: Falmouth to Bigbury-on-Sea

He made it. Yesterday, after a week on the final run up the east coast of Cornwall and across the border into Devon the job is done. Yesterday afternoon, I joined One & Only on the sand at Bigbury-on-Sea to walk the final few hundred metres to the Avon River crossing, as Burgh Island rose out of the sea mist that has smothered the coast in dense fog for three days.

It has been a trek along more than a thousand kilometres of the English coast – bearing in mind that he had completed the Plymouth to Lyme Regis stretch a year or two earlier. This time, as you may remember, we started in Weymouth so he could walk the Jurassic Coast and fill in the gap from Lyme Regis to Poole Harbour. Since then, it’s been six weeks on the long haul from Minehead in Somerset to Bigbury-on-Sea in South Devon, and last night we celebrated at a very pink gastropub in Yealmpton.  

Next on the agenda? Perhaps the new King Charles III England Coast Path of 2,700 miles around the coast of England? Minus the SW Coast loop, of course. Personally, I am hoping for a more sedate stroll along a river or canal, so I can confidently join, without the fear of climbing despairingly steep, hills to reach dramatic cliff tops only to be blown into the Atlantic Ocean or the English Channel. While I am extremely proud of the One & Only’s monumental effort, the challenge of the coastal path has not inspired me. Is that sacrilegious? Or just wimpy? For many, the coastal path seems like a pilgrimage: a purposeful, challenging and hopefully transformational journey, on foot. As I write this, it does start to sound tempting – the opportunity to immerse oneself in these glorious surroundings, spending days in the moment, living, breathing, and observing the world around you, putting one foot in front of the other, day in day out. Still, I think I would prefer a flatter – and less windy – route!

For me, driving through England this summer has been a joy – despite the stresses and strains of which I have frequently grizzled. Yet, those potholed, uncharted lanes like gnarly, knotted knitting, the often calamitous parking arrangements, in the end they just added a touch of spice to days of adventuring among quirky, cobbled fishing villages, wide, tidal beaches, secret coves, buttercup besprinkled cliff tops, thatched pubs and quaint coffee shops, glorious gardens and elegant, ancient manor houses – let’s face it, I’ve actually completed my own version of a pilgrimage without the physical output (although tell that to my shoulder muscles, as I clench the steering wheel to edge past an enormous tractor on a road barely wide enough to overtake  a bicycle!)

So, highlights on this last section? There have been so many, I may only have time for a selection. (And yes, I have still found time to study.) We have also stayed in some great B&Bs. There was a tiny blue carriage house converted into a one-up-one-down cottage that felt like a treehouse, perched on a terrace above the high street and just large enough for our needs, although not much bigger than a wardrobe. Then, there was a garden flat with an indulgence of elbow-room overlooking a wooded valley and an immensely high viaduct for trains. I have wandered through Truro and Falmouth and Mevagissey and a handful of National Trust properties full of summer flowers and huge bumble bees. And I have had to dodge and weave through hobbit-sized villages which were never designed for cars. This stretch has also been particularly generous with waterways: rivers and streams; estuaries and harbours. And sea mist.

***

Early one morning, while delivering the One & Only to his starting point, I came across a small café, hidden down in a damp and shady hollow in the hills, beside a picturesque and peaceful millpond. And, unlike most coffee shops in Cornwall, it was open before 10am. So, after he had set off, I found my way back to Millensey Mill.

For once, I must extend my thanks to my Google Maps navigator, (long since nicknamed Daphne) who guided me unerringly to the mill, where we found a nice roomy carpark and the best coffee I have had since arriving in England. Generally, I have been holding Daphne entirely responsible for her propensity to entangle us among inconceivably narrow country lanes these past two months. I know she has been thinking that it would be a much prettier journey to head along a perfectly lovely cart track hemmed with foxgloves and pink campion than a dreary old motorway. And that would have been fine, had I been driving a tractor. Or a horse. But all was forgiven as I relaxed in the sun beside a tranquil millpond with my coffee and an extremely tasty ciabatta roll crammed with spicy mushrooms, avocado and rocket.  The tables were made of old mill wheels – thick, circular slabs of granite – and I was soon joined by a couple of cheeky robins keen to share my breakfast. Most unexpectedly, I also had an excellent internet connection, so I was able to call the kids in Australia and share the view of Arum lilies reflected in the pond. (And it turns out the Northern Irish barrista learned his trade in Melbourne, hence the excellent coffee!)

***

Another morning, I dropped off my keen and dedicated hiker and went a-wandering to Caerhays Castle, a nineteenth century creation nestled into a nook in the hills overlooking Porthluney Cove. Renowned for its impressive collection of magnolias, azaleas, camellias and rhododendrons, it would definitely be better to visit Caerhays in early spring. While I had missed the hillside garden in its full regalia, I still enjoyed a gentle stroll up woodland paths and along grassy trails, which provided the occasional peek of the castle and the sea beyond.

Although the Williams family still lives at Caerhays, they open it to the public each spring, so everyone can enjoy the garden in all its splendour, and get a glimpse of the castle, too if they so desire. It is also popular for weddings and fetes, with its broad terrace facing the sea, it also starred in Tim Burton’s 2106 movie, Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children and the 1972 BBC adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca.

The crenelated walls of Caerhays castle make it appear well-fortified against invaders, but it is in fact a glorified folly, designed by the 19th century architect John Nash, who was responsible for Regents Street, Piccadilly Circus, Clarence House, and the Royal Pavilion at Brighton, and for converting Buckingham House into Buckingham Palace.

I joined a tour group of three, and we were escorted through the castle by a very informative and enthusiastic guide named Michael, who also provided excellent tips for neighbourhood restaurants. And low and behold, there was a table inlaid with Australian opal and topped with a rather stubby nosed porcelain kookaburra. Michael was delighted with my discovery.

Afterwards, I dropped into the Magnolia Café for morning tea in the old stable yard, which included a leaky tea pot and a slice of Cornish lamington cake. It was nothing like the original Australian lamington – a cube of light sponge dipped in chocolate and desiccated coconut – but this Cornish variety was infinitely more filling: a dense coconut cake, topped with strawberry jam and sprinkled in more coconut.

***

I will finish off with a beautiful dinner at One Polkirt Hill, a restaurant highly recommended by our tour guide at Caerhays Castle. This pocket-sized restaurant serves seafood plucked fresh from the harbour and cooked with a French twist. It is owned by Andre McCowan, once the executive chef at Chelsea Football Club, and his lovely Thai wife Pey, who hosts the dining room and welcomed us like old friends.

We chose a lovely bottle of rose (or maybe two!) and perused the menu. I chose a smoked mackerel pate to start, followed by a Red Thai Curry with prawns, scallops and monkfish, was served with jasmine rice and crunchy prawn crackers. The One & Only went for a beautifully constructed ‘cocktail’ of crabmeat, avocado, and smoked salmon, followed by something from the specials board – monkfish in a brandy and cream sauce. (Of course, there were vegan and red meat choices as well, but it seemed like madness to eat anything but fish when we were sitting only metres from the fishing boats.) It was all, to quote a much-touted TV show, absolutely fabulous.  

As we were starting on our appetizers, our guide from Caerhays Castle turned up with his wife, and was pleased we had approved his recommendation. Dessert? No chance. No room. But a postprandial walk around the harbour before bed was an effective way to settle overstretched stomachs and clear our wine-soaked heads!

Mevagissey has the sweetest little double harbour, which was built on the site of a medieval quay. Once largely dependent on pilchard fishing, it now houses a mixture of fishing boats and pleasure craft, including a passenger ferry to Fowey (pronounced Foy). The town fans out above the harbour, an abundance of slate roofed houses snuggling into the crook of the hill. Apparently, it’s the second largest fishing-port in Cornwall, and we discovered that the locals love fishing from the harbour walls too. I am definitely going back for a longer stay – and a trip on the ferry to Foy!

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Of Tin & Tea & Tidal Rivers

Posted on 15 June 2026 by sheg4184

The penultimate phase: the Lizard Peninsula

I have just been looking at a map that divides Cornwall into six areas, like stripy socks, and noticed that the southern end of the county looks something like a crab claw. So, we have spent the last few days navigating the left-hand claw, which contains the southernmost point of England, Lizard Point and notoriously treacherous coast line, once known as the Graveyard of Ships. We also moved our base to a very pink, very comfortable apartment in Helston.

While nothing is very far away in Cornwall, this 11th century market town is a little off the beaten track as far as the tourist trade is concerned, despite being only a stone’s throw from Lizard Point, Falmouth and St Michael’s Mount. For me, it was equidistant – or almost – to the various drop off and collection points I needed to reach this week, so it proved an incredibly handy place to stay, and it was kind of fun to be in a ‘normal’ town after weeks of tourist towns overflowing with holidaymakers. Even Lizard Point seemed far less commercialized than some of the other popular sites of Cornwall.

So, just a teaspoon of local history on this sunny Saturday morning:

Helston was chartered by King John in 1201. For those of you – like me – who are looking slightly bamboozled by the term ‘chartered’, this means that the monarch has granted the town municipal privileges and the right to self-government. Historically, this allowed Helston to hold markets, collect tolls, and free residents from serfdom. And indeed, there was not a serf to be seen, and Helston still holds regular markets to this day.

Helston’s Guildhall

Helston was also one of four towns in Cornwall in which tin was assessed, formed into coins, stamped and sold in a ‘Coinage Hall’. These were known as Stannary towns. While tin has not been used for making coins since 1838, Helston’s main street is still known as Coinagehall Street, and there we stayed, in an apartment called The Stannary, right above one of the old banks and looking out over the Guildhall. So, hopefully you’ve learned two new and incredibly useful words – if you happen to be in Cornwall!

It’s obvious from the quality of the municipal buildings in Helston that it was once a reasonably wealthy town, largely thanks to the local mine, which once employed over a thousand people. While the outskirts of Helston are hemmed with council houses – practical but not particularly picturesque – the centre of town has a wonderful collection of old stone cottages, terraces and a lovely stone church perched halfway up the hill, where they were holding a choir practice the evening we popped by for a peek. Another evening, we were again entertained by the bell ringers practising on the church bells.

***

Lizard Lighthouse

While the One & Only circumnavigates the Lizard Peninsula on foot – a ‘high point’ or ‘headland’ in Cornish, not a reptile – it has been great fun exploring the coastal villages, tucked into nooks and crannies along the route, or perched atop dramatic cliffs overlooking the Celtic Sea. As I stand on the edge of the precipitous and craggy cliffs at Lizard Point, and face south, I might, if my sight were telescopic, spot Brittany, 200 miles off the coast. Or, turning to the southeast, it’s about 100 miles to Guernsey in the Channel Islands. Too far to swim, but with a small fishing boat perhaps, I could follow the route of the Cornish smugglers to France…

***

I know I’ve said it before and will doubtless say it again, but England never ceases to amaze me, for all the ‘stuff’ that is squeezed onto such a small island. Doctor Who fans will understand the concept: England is an absolute Tardis. Honestly, how is there possibly room for 70 million people, countless towns and cities, endless miles of motorways, copious airports? Yet there is still so much space? I haven’t seen a city in weeks, just lush fields edged in thick hedgerows, broad expanses of empty moorland, uncluttered coastline, lakes and rivers and streams and old stately homes surrounded by acres of parkland. It is gobsmacking.

***

Not far from Helston, on a rare day off, we discovered one such estate at Godolphin. Hidden away in a maze of shady lanes, this fascinating mediaeval estate was built on the wealth of the tin and copper found on the property and was once a significant and rather grand abode. Then the promise of power and position in London tempted the family to leave Cornwall for the capital, and for a hundred and fifty years, Godolphin was left in the hands of tenant farmers, who pulled down the Great Hall and repurposed the stone to build outbuildings, such as stables and byres for the animals, and a cider house.

Godolphin is only open to visitors on the first week of every month (except January), and it was pure fluke that we landed there that week in June, just in time for had an introductory talk about the stew ponds (for fish), the deer park, the orchards and of course life in the house itself, which has housed Sheriffs of Cornwall, Dukes and farmers, when the King’s Chamber was repurposed to store potatoes. The rest of the month it becomes a holiday house, so if you should fancy a holiday in a mediaeval manor house – with all the mod cons of course – it sleeps up to 12 guests. Perfect for one of those 19th century country weekends – without the serfs or the servants!

***

At the end of a long day’s hike, the One & Only is more than happy to wait for me at the nearest pub. On one occasion, this was a beautiful, thatched pub at Helford, overlooking a tidal river not far from Frenchman’s Creek. If you are at all familiar with Daphne du Maurier’s novel of the same name – and another called Jamaica Inn – this should instantly remind you of the long history of smuggling and piracy that goes hand in hand with the history of virtually every coastal village in Cornwall and Devon. Driven by heavy government taxes on imported goods, fishermen and their families worked together to sneak illegal goods from Europe into England, hiding chests of brandy, tea, and tobacco in tunnels, sea caves, and cellars along the jagged and inaccessible coast that was so awkward to police. The more professional smugglers, successfully dodging the customs men for decades and providing employment and contraband for the locals. Also at work, were the wreckers, who purposely lured ships onto the rocks for salvage.

Yet on a mild, summer afternoon in this peaceful riverside village, it is hard to imagine such scenes of violence. As the tide drifts up the estuary, the boats rise off the mud and start to bob about. Bumblebees are purring busily, as they dip in and out of the tall, purple foxglove flowers. Robins and finches dart hither and yon, in and out of the hedgerows, and around our feet checking for crumbs, chirping merrily, like ‘Disney birds,’ as my brother calls them. And the cider is the best I have tasted.

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Combing the Penwith Peninsula

Posted on 7 June 2026 by sheg4184

Phase 6 of the Salt Path: St. Ives to Prussian Bay

‘By Tre, Pol and Pen, Shall ye know all Cornishmen’

On the south western tip of Cornwall (or Kernow as it is known by the Cornubians) is the rugged Penwith Peninsula, wrapped around on three sides by the feisty Atlantic Ocean. From St Ives to Marazion, punctuated by St Michael’s Mount, the lofty, gnarly granite cliffs cup an area of Outstanding Natural Beauty: rolling hills, lush fields and deep wooded valleys, tiny stone villages and steep, winding lanes, ruined remains of old tin mines.

Traditionally a land of farmers and fishermen, the Penwith peninsula has also been one of the most significant areas in the world for tin and copper mining since the Bronze Age. Sadly, the very last working mine closed in 1990, and the area now relies heavily on tourism. But it does explain the vast number of chimney stacks that litter the Cornish countryside – and the Cornish miners who made their way to South Australia in the mid-19th century to take part in the copper boom. Their mining expertise and advanced equipment helped to make the Copper Triangle in the north of the state such a runaway success, and more than repaid the colony for the assisted passage granted to so many of them. By 1865, Cornish settlers made up more than 40% of South Australia’s immigrant population, and the Yorke Peninsula would later become known as Australia’s “Little Cornwall” as Moonta’s copper output surpassed that of Cornwall.

***

Meanwhile, we are staying in the picturesque village of Marazion, overlooking that celebrated little island of St Michael’s Mount. It was once a site for pilgrims, like its cousin across the channel, Mont St Michel, and lies just half-a-mile offshore. At low tide, a causeway is exposed, and you can cross to the island on foot – in fact you don’t even need the causeway, you can just stroll over the sand – but at high tide, it’s necessary to find a willing boatman to bring you back. From almost anywhere in the town, and around Mount’s Bay, you can spot this iconic, fairytale island.

On a mere fraction of a square mile, this rocky outcrop is a microcosm of Cornwall with its granite cliffs crowned by a mediaeval castle and church, wooded slopes to the sea, terraced, subtropical gardens and even a tiny village and a pub. But be warned, there is no access on Saturdays, and you have to be off the island by 5pm any day, presumably to give the thirty-odd residents a break from the onslaught of curious sightseers.

As I have been working as we travel – when I am not playing chauffeur for the obsessed, long-distance walker in my life – I realize there is not always time to visit all the popular tourist destinations along the route. So, I intend to return another day to see Tintagel and Land’s End, the Minack Theatre and St Michael’s Mount, which, despite its proximity, is closed to the public on the one afternoon I am free. So selfish!

There have, however, been some fascinating, off-the-beaten-track discoveries, like St Columb, Boscastle, the Bude Canal and Hive Beach. And I have learnt the little ditty (above) that explains how the ancient Celtic prefixes still denote historic Cornish surnames and villages: ‘Tre’ is an ancient Cornish word meaning ‘homestead’ or ‘settlement’ as in Tregony and Trelissick; ‘Pol’, which meand a ‘pool’, a ‘pond’, a ‘well’ or a ‘cove’, as in Polperro or Polruan; ‘Pen’ which means headland or hill, as in Penzance or Pendeen. There are others, too, such as chy (pronounced ‘chee’) which means ‘house’ or ‘home in Cornish, as in Chyvarloe.And then there’s Cornubia, the ancient Latin name for Cornwall meaning people of the horn, referring to the shape And then there’s the Morrab Library & Gardens in Penzance…

***

Arriving early in Marazion – hours before we could gain access to our latest abode – we followed the trusty oak leaf to Trengwainton Gardens, just outside Penzance. The gardens were, of course, reliably beautiful, mixing wilder woodlands with tropical plants and a huge expanse of walled gardens. We do love a walled garden! So, we wandered through the mizzling rain, and eventually discovered a café and a second hand book shop. It was here that I inadvertently found my hideaway for the week: a private library in the heart of Penzance. And my heartfelt thanks to Kelvin, who suggested it might be an interesting place to study. So, I overcame all the aggravations of parking issues and impossibly narrow lanes to find this wonderful library, surrounded by the splendours of another rather lovely garden.

The Morrab Library (Cornish for ‘by the sea’) is one of only fifty independent libraries in Britain, and was founded in 1818 by ‘the great and good’ of Penzance who were apparently tired of hearing themselves mocked by the Londoners, and decided to indulge in a spot of reading to improve their minds and their social kudos. Over the years, the library has outgrown several homes around Penzance,  and now lives in stately splendour at Morrab House, a splendid Victorian house with high ceilings and large windows, and walls lined floor-to-ceiling with bookshelves. The house has gradually filled with donations from generous Cornish benefactors, and many of the books are incredibly old and rather special. I even found one by a 19th century female travel writer, whose trip to China provided amazing context for my own research.

***

The One & Only has taken on the wind and rain this week, as our steamy, summery May turns into a wild & woolly June.  Luckily, he had a couple of friends for moral support earlier in the week. And despite the unpredictable showers, he managed a bit of seal spotting between St Ives and Pendeen Lighthouse, while I was sipping coffee (undercover) by the sea pool at Penzance, during a short study break. Everything here is such an easy distance. Having moved house, I was gobsmacked to see we were still only 8 miles from St. Ives. Even our local pub – The Fire Engine – is no more than 50m from the front door with glorious views of St Michael’s Mount.

Our cottage – which shall be renamed Bumblebee Cottage as it is so themed – is a quaint little gem a few steps up the hill from Marazion’s market square. For anyone over 5’5″ there’s a bit of ducking required to avoid concussion, but it is beautifully appointed, with a terraced garden at the back that hangs above the rooftops, as long as you don’t mind clambering up a dozen very steep slate covered steps. (They very wisely left us plastic wine glasses for outdoor boozing! Did I mention I love cider?)

***

Today, as I was about to wrap this up on a wine-sozzled note, the Wild and Woolly has turned into a proper tantrum. The wind whistled around the house all night and this morning the roads were strewn with leaf litter and stray branches. And still the One & Only was not deterred. I am so proud of his persistence – but is he just a little bit mad? Apparently the wind on the track is almost blowing him backwards!

Anyway, our devoted GPS “Daphne” decided, in her infinite wisdom, to take us off the main road this morning and redirect us down a back lane that rapidly grew narrower and narrower, with no place to turn and hedgerows that were closing in on us like some horror movie. Would it come to a dead end? How on earth could we ever reverse? Would there be any paint left on the car at all?! We made it out eventually, but it was more like a pedestrian track by the time it found the main road again. I am now back in Penzance enjoying a savoury cream tea to settle the nerves: cheese scone, Philadelphia cream cheese and chutney. Anyone got the brandy??

Thank goodness we are moving to the east coast tomorrow – I have my fingers crossed for calmer weather once we are no longer facing the tempest-torn Atlantic.

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Of Martyrs and Artists and Clamorous Bells

Posted on 4 June 2026 by sheg4184

Phase 5 of the Salt Path: Boscastle to St Ives

This past week, we have been based in St Columb Major, a Cornish town a few miles inland, and well away from the hustle and bustle and total chaos of the seaside towns over half term.

St Columb Major is named for a sixth century Cornish saint (saintess?) St Columba, who was martyred by a pagan king for refusing to renounce her faith and was apparently buried somewhere around here.  It is a quaint little town, with impossibly narrow streets and very little parking, but the centre contains many lovely slate hung houses and several stately bank buildings. (Oh, by the way, the label ‘Major’ distinguishes it from St Columba Minor, a neighbouring village on the outskirts of Newquay.)

Apparently St Columb Major was once destined to be the banking capital of Cornwall, but then Truro took over as the county capital, and St Columb has become largely overlooked since it was bypassed by the Atlantic Highway (aka A39) that charges down from Bath, through Somerset  and Devon to finish its journey some 200 miles later in Falmouth, on the south east coast of Cornwall.

In the centre of town, overlooking the churchyard, stands St Columba’s Church. Built in the 14th century, it boasts an eighty foot belltower, containing eight church bells. In 1920 a chiming clock was added, as a memorial to the local boys who died in World War I. Less than 100 metres from our bedroom window, that clock chimed like Big Ben at every quarter hour and then struck the hour as well. As a special bonus, the town’s most excellent and dedicated bell-ringers practice for two or three hours on a Wednesday and are justly proud of their expertise. I wasn’t at all sure they needed quite so much practise – they sounded well-nigh perfect to me! My ears are still ringing…

***

As we venture further into Cornwall, it is amazing to see how many artists have established themselves in this remote county. Every town we pass through, we find at least one private gallery, often more. Seascapes and fishing villages, stormy moors and sweeping sandy beaches abound.

Cornwall has been a major hub for British art for decades and is defined by three distinct movements. The Newlyn School was a colony of artists based just south of Penzance in the fishing port of Newlyn, from 1880 until WWI. These painters were inspired by the French Impressionists who loved to paint outdoors and capture the natural light, typically finishing a piece in a single sitting. In Newlyn they found the light wondrous, the rent inexpensive, and models – usually local fisherman and their families – remarkably cheap.

In the mid-20th century, St Ives became a renowned hub for Modernist painters, sculptors, and potters, including Dame Barbara Hepworth and her husband Ben Nicholson. There is even a St Ives Tate these days, where many of the most famous Cornish artists are exhibited. We spent a quiet morning there, exploring its collection of modern art and enjoying the fabulous views over the rooftops of St. Ives, Porthmeor Beach and the Atlantic Ocean.

Cornish Naïve Art emerged between the world wars, in response to the work of Alfred Wallis, an artist without formal training who began painting at the age of 70, in something of the style of Lowry or Ken Done.

Today, many contemporary artists still gravitate to the dramatic Cornish coast and bucolic countryside. So, it was a particular joy to discover that our cosy flat in St Columb was owned by a Cornish artist and his wife.

Jeremy Annear is a renowned Modernist and abstract artist, who lives and works in St Columb Major, his studio and gallery just metres from his front door. While I am totally ignorant when it comes to abstract art, I learned a lot this week, chatting to Jeremy over a bottle of Rosé and hearing how he processes the world around him to create the simple lines, block colours, and geometric forms that reflect his unique, somewhat stark vision of the landscape. Standing in his gallery and contemplating his paintings, I was surprised to find myself drawn into his images, and perhaps even beginning to understand what he was trying to achieve; starting to glimpse what was beneath the surface. And imagine my even greater surprise to discover a small Aboriginal dot painting leaning against the wall just inside his gallery. Apparently, he has made several visits to Australia and has been inspired by the ‘graphic elements’ of Indigenous Australian art.

***

After hours of trudging along the Cornish coast each day, the One & Only has been perfectly happy to put his feet up and survive on my cooking, and with a great little space in the heart of the town, we were not terribly inspired to eat out this week. Especially as the reputable pub next door had been recently sold and had yet to reopen. We did, however, enjoy a cider or two at a local pub, when I went to collect the intrepid walker at the end of each day, so he was at least rewarded with a beer after all his effort.

So, I got to meet Boscastle, a tiny village owned by the National Trust, that is tucked into a deep cleft in the landscape just north of Tintagel. We didn’t have time to stop for long – and don’t drive down there if you are prone to vertigo – but we were able to spend a lovely, tranquil hour there, following a family of soft, fluffy ducklings along the little River Valency to the harbour, laughing as they bounced over – and under – the miniature rapids with infectious delight. The natural harbour at Boscastle is protected by a 16th century stone wall, and from the top of the wall, you can see the blowhole just beyond the harbour entrance, which shoots out a horizontal spout at low tide.

Unfortunately, I gave only a passing nod to Port Isaac – Doc Martin territory – and was forced to scoop up the One and Only from the forecourt of the Co-op supermarket at the top of the town, as all the car parks were school-holiday-choc-a-block. When I dropped him off the following morning, to continue on his merry way, I thought I may be stuck there forever, as the lanes near that famous wee harbour were so narrow, and I had to squeeze between the Hobbit-sized – but very solid – houses with an equally solid car that was not inclined to imitate the Knight Bus.

Our next successful pickup point was at Rock, an extremely popular holiday destination across the Camel estuary from Padstow. It’s got a much more romantic name in the original Cornish, but I can neither remember it or spell it, so Rock it is. Rock is crawling with foodies and holidaymakers and their Down-From-London juggernauts, and has been nicknamed both ‘the Kensington of Cornwall’ and ‘Chelsea-on-sea’ as a nod to its more affluent visitors. Thanks to an unusually hot half term, all the beach dwellers were a bright shade of lobster. By pure fluke, I managed to snag a parking space, so we were able to enjoy a walk on the vast sandbank on the northern side of the estuary and even have a drink at a bar overlooking the ferry to Padstow, a multitude of boats moored in the shallows between.

For some reason, Perranporth had stuck in my head as a pretty name, and as it also boasted a 2- mile stretch of beach heading north to Newquay, I thought it might be worth a visit. It wasn’t going to work as a pickup point, but I wandered down anyway and met the One & Only for morning tea, instead. The tide was right out, exposing veritable hectares of sand that were the delight of every local dog and its owner.

By the time I took off, the carpark – almost empty when I arrived – was crammed with holiday makers. Does this blog seem heavily focused on carparks? To be honest, it has been the most stressful part of the trip, steering our overly large car around tiny streets and into extremely cramped parking spaces – if there were any to be had. And let me add, anything bigger than a Fiat 500 would be overly large around here! So, I was very grateful to reach St Ives and find a more-than-generous carpark at the top of the town. I only wish I’d had roller skates – or skis – to whizz down the almost vertical footpath to the harbour.

St. Ives was our last collection point before we left St Columb, which happily coincided with a day off for the One & Only, and gave us a chance to spend a happy, sunny day in this delightful town. Here we found cobbled, pedestrianized streets, quaint old fishermen’s houses, pretty shops and a plethora of art galleries, copious venues with rooftop bars, and not one but several coves and beaches. This was our day to visit the Tate, inspect the Lifeboat Station on the West Pier with its  £5,000 rescue boat and tractor, enjoy a Thai lunch on Wharf Road and walk a lap of ‘The Island’ – or rather the headland – above Porthgwidden Beach. On this broad, grassy bluff with its panoramic views of the town and coastline, we found a brief and peaceful respite  from the crowds along the seafront. We also found a small stone chapel perched on the top. St Nicholas was the patron saint of sailors, as well as children, so he was a most suitable saint to give his name to this pocket-sized chapel that is surrounded by sea on three sides.

And now it is time to move on across the Penwith Peninsula to meet some friends near Penzance…

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Down on the Border

Posted on 24 May 2026 by sheg4184

‘…For men must work, and women must weep,
Though storms be sudden, and waters deep,
And the harbour bar be moaning.’
. ~ Charles Kingsley (Three Fishers)

Phase 4: The Salt Path: Westward Ho! to Bude

Our accommodation these past few days has been a lovely, comfortable, compact barn conversion that sits right on the border between Devon and Cornwall and covered us for  the stretch of the Salt Path from Westward Ho! in Devon – the only town in Britain with an exclamation mark in its name – to Boscastle in Cornwall. Along the way there has been a plethora of remote, picturesque fishing villages, complete with doll-sized stone cottages and steep, narrow streets, completely unsuitable for any vehicle but a donkey.

One such village was the childhood home of historian, novelist, and poet Charles Kingsley, who, you may remember, wrote The Water Babies. He was also responsible for a poem, ‘The Three Fishers’, about the harsh realities of a fisherman’s life, their families constantly alert to the life-threatening dangers of working on the sea. The poem was published in 1851. It was later set to music by English composer John Hullah and became a popular ballad. (Coincidentally, Australian writer Henry Handel Richardson used the line ‘And women must weep’ as a title for one of her short stories written in 1931.)

Clovelly is an age-old fishing village that has somehow evolved down the centre of a dramatic ravine in the cliff face, on the rugged north coast of Devon, overlooking Bideford Bay. Consisting of eighty-three cottages, Clovelly is privately owned, with no cars, no stairs, no lift, not even a zip line for easier access. Visitors – and residents – must park their cars at the top of the cliff, and make their way down the precipitous, cobbled high street on foot. Preferably not in heels! In the past, donkeys were used for transport. Now they are enjoying their retirement, and residents must use sleds to pull everything up and down the hill, from furniture to food, luggage to garbage.  Even the local milkman uses a sled apparently!

How fit must you be to live here?

Originally, the land at the top of the cliff was farmed by the Celts, who built an Iron Age fort on a plateau, known as Clovelly Dykes. Located just a mile inland from Clovelly village, it is one of the largest hill forts in Devon. So how many are there to compare? Apparently fifty!

After 1066, the Clovelly estate was owned by William the Conqueror, who gifted it to his wife, Matilda, and had it entered in the Doomsday Book, that first giant survey of England and Wales completed on the orders of King William. In 1242, it was acquired by the Giffard family, also Normans. (I wonder about that word acquired. It could cover a multitude of sins. Was it bought, stolen, gifted..?

Within a hundred years it had changed hands again, and been purchased by the Cary family, who was responsible for building the drystone breakwater at the base of the cliff, to replace a rudimentary, 13th century quay and thus create a solid, safe harbour for the local fishermen.

Due to its perilous cliffs and treacherous seas, this stretch of coastline once earned the nickname “The Shipwreck Coast.” While these shipwrecks were sometimes caused by bad weather – or poor navigating – the area was also infamous for ‘wreckers’. These local smuggling gangs deliberately lured ships onto the rocks in order to pillage and plunder their cargo. (Try reading Daphne Du Maurier’s book Jamaica Inn for the grisly details.) And when the fog hangs low over the cliffs and the wind whips across the sea, it’s not hard to imagine a world of brutal pirates, cunning smugglers and grinding poverty, and the likes of Joss Merlyn growling ‘dead men tell no tales.’

Christine Hamlyn inherited the estate in 1884. When she married in 1889, she and her husband went to work renovating the cottages.  She also asked him to change his name, as hers had such a long connection with Clovelly, and there were no male heirs.

 John Rous, the current owner of Clovelly, is Christine’s great grand-nephew, and has continued her work there, ensuring that the village is not taken over by holiday makers, but remains a real community; the cottages are leased only to full-time residents who live and work in the neighbourhood. It is, however, the tourists who keep the village intact: the entrance fee charged to visitors helps to maintain the buildings and ensures Clovelly retains its unique charm and timelessness.

Unfortunately, we did not stay long – the One & Only had just finished a gruelling day’s walk and was ready for a hot shower – but we paused at the inn for a cider, said a quick hello to the donkeys, and enjoyed a few moments at a lookout above the harbour. My ticket was good for 24 hours, so I popped back in the morning to watch the film about its history and village life. I was going to venture back down to the village or perhaps to the gardens at Clovelly Court, but the mizzle had set in, and I was wary of slipping on the cobblestones and ending up in the sea!

And speaking of cider…

Just in case you have never come across it – however unlikely that sounds – let me introduce you to my favourite local beverage. Cider is an ancient alcoholic libation made from the fermented juice of apples, unlike beer, which is brewed from barley and hops.

As I am not a beer lover, cider was my best (cheapest) option when I first went backpacking around Europe. In South Australia, where wine is King, I don’t often consider drinking cider. But back in the west country this summer, it has become the obvious choice. (FYI: ciders from the Southwest of England are generally higher in alcoholic content.)

Cider can be sweet or dry; cloudy or clear; light gold to dark amber brown; sparkling or still. Most types of apples, including crab apples, can be used to make cider.

Cider has been around for centuries. Apparently, Julius Caesar found the Celts fermenting crab apples right back in 55 BCE. While these days the recipe and the taste for cider have spread all over the world, cider is a quintessentially English beverage, its history deeply rooted in England’s southern counties, Kent and Somerset, and the “Three Counties” of Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Worcestershire. Traditional English scrumpy is a rustic robust style, typically cloudy, still, and filled with apple flavour. But I won’t drown you too deeply in the folklore of cider-making. I’ll simply recommend that if you’ve never tasted it, try it. See what you think.

In the meantime, lets go for a stroll to Bude, a more accessible seaside town just south of the border, but still on Bideford Bay, at the mouth of the River Neet. Originally a busy harbour, it became a popular seaside resort in the Victorian era. And there is an amazing tidal pool on Summerleaze Beach to the north of the estuary, which is hugely popular with local bathers.

Much of this coastline is protected by the National Trust, who began a campaign in 1965 ‘to address the rising threat of overdevelopment of the coast’. Since then, the Trust has acquired almost 900 miles of seaboard around Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which recently includes a stretch of cliffs at Tintagel in northern Cornwall and a strip of coastal grassland near Swanage, which we visited earlier this month.

Back in Bude, we arrived at the crack of dawn, as the weatherman was predicting hotter days this week, and the One & Only was keen to start early. Needing a leg stretch, I found a suitable carpark and wandered up and over the first hill with the One & Only, before circling back into town. I had parked the car in the middle of the island formed by the river and the Bude canal.

Have you ever seen a canal that ends up in the sea? Of course, it only works when the tide is high, or the boats would through that final lock onto the sand! Apparently, it was built to transport mineral rich sand up to the farms for fertiliser, and rose, through two locks, from sea level to an altitude of 132 metres. I tried to understand a lengthy description of its construction but, not coming from engineering stock, found myself utterly bamboozled. Regardless of how it was made, the results, for mere pedestrians, are lovely. And beside the canal – where I’d parked the car – there was, on this lovely Friday morning, a local market setting up.

The Bude Farmers & Craft market is held on the wharf every Friday from Easter to the beginning of September, from 10am – 3pm. There were all sorts of fresh produce, crafts and clothing available, and I had soon filled the boot with a grainy malt loaf, two quiches, a bottle of local cider and an Oak Leaf wine. Oh, and a sharp and crumbly cheddar. Well, far be it from me to leave such a fabulous block of cheese behind.

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“A Wimpling Wind”*

Posted on 17 May 2026 by sheg4184

Phase 3 of the Salt Path: Lynmouth to Westward Ho!

Wandering through a tranquil wilderness beneath dappled beechwoods, I emerge into green fields beside a still and silent lake, and it is hard to imagine that I am in the middle of an island of almost 70 million people. There is not a person in sight and not even a murmur of traffic. Only the restful sound of wind in the trees, the soft twittering of birds and an invisible stream down at the bottom of the valley purling and plashing over the rocks. Down on the coast, it was a thoroughly Pooh Bear Blustery day. Here, among the beechwoods, there is only a peaceful serenity as I tread softly along the muddy path. To my left the hillside is submerged in trees, to my right a steep grassy slope is sprinkled with azaleas, gorse bushes and ferns…

Earlier this morning I left the One & Only on the windblown coast neart Combe Martin to hike to Woolacombe, before ducking inland to stretch my legs in the grounds of the Arlington Court estate. Yes, it is indeed another National Trust gem.

As I followed the oak leaf signposts along the constricted, twisting lanes, boxed in by overhanging beech trees and hedgerows, I felt as if I were hurtling down an endless luge track with as much control as the ball in a giant pinball machine, ricocheting past flippers, bumpers, and slingshots. Yet, gradually, as I banked around the curves and accelerated down the infrequent straights, I realized that I was at last rediscovering my long-neglected skills for skimming round hair pin bends and dodging milk trucks and tractors by a whisker. I was Ernie Prang driving the purple Knight Bus, holding my breath as I squeezed through the incy-wincy gaps between those unforgiving stone walls and muscle-bound SUVs. And somehow, I arrived safely at the Leaky Cauldron. Or rather, at Arlington Court.

In the Visitor Centre, I discovered that the house wouldn’t be open to the public for another hour. Never mind, I now had the perfect opportunity to explore the grounds. Arlington Court and its 2,700-acre estate belonged to one family for several centuries, and apparently it is a nine-mile hike around its boundary. Yeah-but-no-but. Today I would only take the two-mile Lake Path, after which I had promised myself a cup of tea at the Old Kitchen Café.  

Deep in the woods, doubtless full to the brim with fairies, I nod to the brambles and beech trees, Scots pines and newly minted oaks. I pass by a vivid display of pink campion and a scattering of early bluebells, then a bank of large, glossy yellow kingcups. The unappealingly pungent smell of onion weed catches me unawares, yet it is somehow nostalgic. As I pad along the woodland path, childhood memories of Flower fairy books drift through my mind, and I wonder if there be dragons in the bottom of the valley. Busy blackbirds dart among the ferns ahead of me, before spinning into the shadows. An impertinent grey squirrel scurries across the path and dashes up a nearby tree trunk, before he realizes I am there. Then, like a game of Grandmother’s Footsteps, he freezes, stock still, imagining this makes him invisible. As grey clouds mass overhead, it’s not a good time to remember that I have left my raincoat in the boot of the car, or to notice that my sneakers have sprung a leak.

Emerging at last from the dim and shadowy wood, the landscape opened out towards Exmoor National Park. A green hill like a patchwork quilt, its uneven squares edged with hedgerows and spangled with sheep. Rounding the bend towards the house, I spotted splashes of shocking pink on a tall, skimpily clad azalea. Further on, I reached the back corner of Arlington Court, where a full blown and bosomy azalea was parading a profusion of fuchsia flowers. And beside the azalea, the Old Kitchen tea rooms, where a pot of tea and a slice of orange and poppyseed cake was waiting for me.

***

In the beginning, there was a Tudor house-cum-hunting lodge near a mediaeval Church. By the late 18th century, the house needed upgrading, to reflect the more prestigious status of its owner. A fashionable country seat was designed and built beside the original, but within thirty years this shoddy Georgian replacement developed severe structural faults, and the site had to be abandoned. The latest iteration is an unprepossessing, boxy, grey-stone Regency house built some distance from the original. The owner, however, Colonel John Palmer Chichester, died before it was completed. His son, Alexander, added a servants wing; his grandson, Sir Bruce Chichester, added further extensions, to both the house and the stables.

The last owner of Arlington Court was Miss Rosalie Caroline Chichester, the only child of Sir Bruce Chichester, and I have become fascinated with her story. When Rosalie was only sixteen, Sir Bruce, died at the age of thirty-eight, of brucellosis. A pun? Apparently not. Brucellosis is a rare infection you can catch from unpasteurised milk and cheese or from contact with infected animals.

Rosalie inherited the entire estate at twenty-one, along with the vast debt her predecessors had incurred; debt that would take her almost half a century to repay. She never married, but lived all her life at Arlington Court, managing the estate and following her passions for photography, painting, writing and collecting, and turned her home into a private repository. She was also a keen protector of wildlife – to the detriment of the local hunt, who were legally forbidden to hunt across her estate. She also established Arlington as a sanctuary for rare breeds of sheep and Exmoor ponies.

Rosalie was a suffragist, supporting the campaign for women’s right to vote, but she did not approve of the militant methods of the suffragettes. Rosalie and her mother were both prominent members of the Primrose League, an organisation, founded in 1883 to support Conservative, or Tory, Party principles. (Unusually, women were included from the beginning, although eventually a separate Ladies Branch was formed.)

Her story brought to mind Jane Austen’s Emma Woodhouse, who tells her friend Harriet very firmly that she will never be an old maid to be mocked by society for her poverty. As ‘a single woman, of good fortune’ Emma could maintain her independence from both ridicule and marriage, for her wealth would always ensure her respectability. Rosalie Chichester appears to have heeded Miss Austen’s advice, for she chose never to marry, but nonethless maintained a busy, interesting – and presumably respectable – life without resorting to her parents lavish and flamboyant lifestyle.

Born in 1865, Rosalie was educated at home by a governess, and obviously learned enough in the school room to manage the sizeable estate she inherited at twenty one. In contrast to another Austen character, she chose to retrench, prioritizing repayment of debt over personal extravagances. As a child, she had travelled widely with her parents, aboard her father’s yacht, and would do so again, in later life, with her paid companion, Miss Chrissie Peters, but not until the debts were cleared. In the 1920s, however, she travelled to Australia and New Zealand, and took a round the world cruise. The travel bug was obviously a family gene: her nephew, Sir Francis Chichester, was the first man to circumnavigate the world solo.

When she died, in her eighties, her ashes were buried on the bank of the lake at Arlington Court. Adamant that the property would not be turned into a golf course or made into an exclusive club for the elite, she bequeathed her entire estate to the National Trust for everyone to enjoy. Since then, the National Trust have done much to restore the long-neglected grounds to their former splendour.

The house has become something of a museum, reflecting Rosalie’s many interests: collections of pewter and silver; art and textiles; rare seashells and a ridiculous number of model sailing ships (her father had owned two full-sized ones, which presumably added to the vast debt he left behind). Following her example, the National Trust has collected around forty carriages and created a museum in the old stable block. I didn’t make it over to the stables today, as my work was calling. But it’s always good to leave something for next time…

*’A wimpling wind’ comes from the Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poem, “The Windhover”.

**The image of the Primrose League badges came from Henrygb at English Wikipedia. – Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3970414.

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