Monday, 29 October 2018

A Fortnight in Cornwall #3 - Heading South to Boscastle and Tintagel

Hi there everyone 😀

Whilst it's a beautiful bright crisp autumn day here, the clocks going back this weekend, and the frost on the car this morning, are real signs that winter is not too far away.

We are back with some Cornish sunshine for this morning's post. It was the Tuesday of our first week and we were heading South with Lesley and Tom. 

We were planning to have a wander along the river and a good old mooch round the little shops in Boscastle, followed by a visit to Tintagel, where pasties were definitely on the cards, along with trying to spot the recently installed 'Gallos' sculpture, which sits high on the cliffs above Tintagel Castle.

We parked up in Boscaslge and whilst it was a bit on the cool side, the weather was better than hoped and we headed along the river towards the coast.

Back in 2004, before Martin and I had met, I'd been on holiday in Bude and was on my way home as the area was hit with horrendous flooding. It was heartbreaking to watch the devastation of such a beautiful spot unfold on the TV news, having only been walking in the area a few days previously. It was hard to imagine today, with the river just gently rolling towards the sea ...
We started our walk, heading up to the right of The Harbour Light, which had to be completely rebuilt following the floods, having been completely destroyed after being hit by a camper van as it was washed down the river ...
We headed up to the viewpoint above the harbour, where you can just see Queen Victoria's rock in the distance ...
We were still on the lookout for signs of autumn and we weren't disappointed ...
We didn't carry on out to Queen Victoria's rock but decided to re-trace our steps and have a wander along the other side of the river, along the side of the harbour ...
We sat for a while in the shelter of the harbour wall, just taking in the views looking back up the river ...
... before heading out a bit further where we just sat on the rocks and took in the view ...
It was a lot easier to see Queen Victoria's profile from this side ...
... and all but me managed to catch a glimpse of a seal swimming in the sea ... or so they said 😀

After a good while sat just watching the sea we headed back along the river and into the village ...
From Boscastle we made our way along the coast to Tintagel. We managed to find a sneaky free parking space on the side of the road by the Castle Hotel, where we headed into the grounds as I knew there were some great views of the castle from here.
To say it was windy would be the understatement of the century ... we were nearly blown off our feet, it would be fair to say it was pretty invigorating ...
It's not the first time Martin and I have seen the castle from this angle. On one of our first visits to Cornwall together we found one of our very first Geocaches on the cliffside, it's how I knew that the views were worth a look.

After a good look across to the castle, pretty much deciding that we wouldn't be climbing the steps for a visit, we headed into town to be able to tick off one of our objectives for the day ... real Cornish pasties, ate out of the paper bag, sat on a bench on the high street ... classy 😂
We had a quick wander up the high street where Martin couldn’t resist a few purchases before heading back to the car before heading off towards the church ... but not before Martin and Tom shared their ancestry ...

A narrow and bumpy lane found us at our next free parking spot, up by the church on the top of the cliffs, where blue sky put in an appearance. It was just beautiful ...
We spent a while doing s spot of geocaching, which involved a good look around the church and the churchyard, followed by just a short wander up the lane ...
... where we were pleased to find what we were looking for ...
It was from here we were hoping to be able to catch a glimpse of the 'Gallos' sculpture across on Tintagel Island ...
We did get some great views through Tom's binoculars, but the camera struggled a bit with the distance ... even the Canon with its mega zoom.

It looked really eerie in the distance, with not a soul to be seen. We found out later that the island and castle had actually been closed because of the high winds.
It was then back to the car to start to head back home, with just a quick call in at Crackington Haven for an ice cream and a wander on the beach as we were passing through ...

We'd had the loveliest of days and, all too soon, it was time to head for home ...
Very unusually for us we ended up going out to eat for the evening. We were going to head into Bude for fish and chips from The Mermaid, but rain was threatening so we had a change of plan and decided to try out the Bay View Inn, somewhere we’ve driven past numerous times but never visited.

It was lovely sitting there, tucked up inside watching the waves roll in. We had a lovely meal, the boys taking advantage of the Tuesday night pie and pud offer, definitely somewhere worthy of a revisit, especially if we could manage to sit outside.

Absolutely shattered we parted company, with plans to head North for Clovelly on the following day.

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