Cornwall, October 2019, day 5

Saturday 26th - Boscastle and the All Hallows Gathering

My friend had suggested this particular week for me to go down to visit her because at the end of it was a pagan-y, witchy event held nearby, and we're both into that sort of thing. It was the sixth annual All Hallow's Dark Gathering in Boscastle, home of the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic. I didn't really know what to expect, as the event's website didn't have much detail about the schedule, but was intrigued and looking forward to it. I didn't notice the archive of blog posts about all the previous events - those would have given me a much better idea, haha.

The morning was a lazy one - I stayed in bed and read my book while my friend and her parents watched the Rugby World Cup Semi-Final in the lounge; I did end up slightly regretting that, as it turned out to be a rather impressive and historic match, but oh well. In the afternoon we all drove up to Boscastle, just a few miles away, and met up with my friend's aunt and her family who were on holiday as well.

There had been storytelling sessions in the museum earlier in the day, but we arrived too late for that. The Morris dancing started at 3pm outside the museum so we walked down there to watch it amongst a good crowd of witches, pagans, folky folks and curious members of the general public. It was windy and cold! But thankfully, surprisingly - magically - the rain which had been falling all day stopped just 40 minutes beforehand and held off for the rest of the event. There were three Morris groups: Wreckers Border Morris, based locally in North Cornwall, Beltane Border Morris, based in Dartmoor, and raven-masked duo Huginn & Muninn, from London. The latter, named after Norse god Odin's two raven companions and inspired by Scandinavian myths and legends, were unique, funny, and a little bizarre, at one point replacing their raven masks with enormous black opaque balloons. There was an MC who explained the context before each dance, but the wind and the rushing river were too loud for me to hear him from where I stood. It was good to see some teenage members among the dancers, too.

Morris dancers outside the Museum of Witchcraft & Magic

I enjoyed all the dancing, but my favourite Morris side was definitely Beltane, I loved them immediately. Inspired by the myths, legends and wilds of Dartmoor, they're darker and have more intensity than most Morris I've seen (which isn't loads, I grant you); there are no bells or handkerchiefs or white outfits, it's sticks and drums and roaring voices and black tattered clothes and blackened faces, their fiery energy delving into something ancient, deep, and mysterious. I'd join them in a heartbeat if I could.

Some Morris sides, like Beltane, practice "blacking", blackening their faces, which causes controversy because many people assume it has something to do with race. It doesn't. In addition to being an ages-old disguise which brings a sense of anonymity, mystery, the supernatural, and the dark side, it's actually a way of remembering the oppression of working classes. In the past, poor land labourers used to perform dances or mummers plays to raise money for food or other necessities, and would blacken their faces so they wouldn't be recognised and punished or victimised for begging. More horrifically, following the activities of a couple of large, organised groups of poachers who blackened their faces to try and avoid identification, in 1723 the British government passed the "Black Act", introducing the death penalty for 50 criminal acts (bringing the total number of capital offences up to around 200, the highest number for any country, ever). From then on, people could be executed just for blacking their face or wearing a mask, among countless other small things like fishing in a private pond or damaging a hedge, and the legal rights of defendants were almost non-existent. While we in the UK thankfully no longer have the death penalty, dire poverty still exists, as do laws largely protecting the interests of comfortable property owners, and the poor are often victimised and powerless. So Morris dancers painting their faces black is a way of remembering, bearing witness, and standing in solidarity.

I felt bad for Cwmni Gwerin Pontypwl, the little group of traditional Welsh dancers who performed when the Morris dancing took a break at 4, as most of the audience dispersed. I'm sorry to say it just wasn't interesting enough to hold my attention in the chilly wind and I went with my friend and her family up the street to get something to eat, to tide us over till dinner. The chip shop had a little marker plaque on to indicate how high the 2004 floodwaters had reached; it was above everyone's heads. The Morris dancing resumed for a while before finishing around 5pm, and we went up to sit in the pub and warm up. Before the lantern procession at 6pm, we crossed the little river and walked down the length of the narrow harbour, past the two 16th-century harbour walls, to the inlet, and stood there for a while looking out at the glimpse of sunset on the horizon between the cliffs. A seal popped its head up a few times.

Boscastle's harbour inlet

Boscastle harbour

The procession would make its way down from the main car park at the top of the village to the museum, so we waited by the museum, where at 6pm there appeared Penkevyll the Lands End 'Oss and her Teazers. The 'Oss was a sort of hobby horse, a decorated and caped horse's skull carried on a stick or pole by someone hidden beneath the black, yellow-ribbonned cape, and the Teazers led her in a dance (https://youtu.be/hTt2h8vdA2s). I loved the drums, tribal and trance-like. Another 'Oss wandered around through the crowd dressed in a bright blue cape decorated with seashells and led by a Rider walking in front holding a rein. It was interesting. The dance and drumming continued as a sort of summons until the procession arrived, bringing Penkevyll's "bone sisters" the Mari Lwyds, from Wales, to join her. One was cloaked in white with red ribbons, but the other was the creepiest of the three - standing like seven feet tall, cloaked in black, the skull painted black and decorated with white swirls and dots, little red lights in the eye sockets, a fake pigeon also with red eyes perching on top of the skull, and dark blue fairy lights wrapped around the top of it like some sort of crown.

Penkevyll the 'Oss and her Teazers

The Pwnco Ceremony followed. Penkevyll and her Teazers went into the museum, and the Mari Lwyds stopped at the door to beseech entry. I was too far away to hear or see the goings-on, but the Welsh dancers accompanying the Mari Lwyds spoke traditional ritual verses in Welsh, which were responded to in Cornish. Eventually they were successful and joined Penkevyll in the museum to bless it for the coming year.

Outside in the twilight, lit only by a few flaming torches around the circle, next up was storytelling duo Stone Soup. They were good, energetic, but unfortunately the wind meant that I couldn't hear most of it so couldn't follow the story. It was something about a soldier who meets a stranger who convinces him to work for him for seven years, looking after his cooking pots but not being allowed to look inside them. All I can really remember is the repeated refrains of "Chop, chop, chop! Feed, feed, feed! Bubble, bubble, bubble! Sweep, sweep, sweep!"

The overcast sky meant that it was almost full dark by this point. When the story finished and the event's MC started to say something about a dark apparition sometimes seen in deepest Dorset, "an eerie, unholy rhythm involving drums, fiddle, and voice commenced" (quote from the event's blog - it's a cool description and I couldn't have put it any more interestingly). Glowing red smoke started billowing on the hillside above the performance area, from which rose up a huge head, human-featured but horned and otherworldly. The Darkest Ooser slowly made its way down the hill to the gathered crowd, led by a thick chain in the hand of a creepy attendant who was shrouded in black and carrying a skull-topped staff. After moving around the edge of the audience, its huge red eyes staring, the Ooser stepped back to watch the rest of the proceedings.

A beautiful prayer-like song was sung. Due to the strong wind and the un-amplified voice, I couldn't really hear it, but I've since discovered it was The Traveller's Prayer written by folk musician John Renbourne (https://youtu.be/BRxK6tl4-1M). Then one of the Beltane men stepped forward. Holding a staff at arms length, pointed towards the crowd, he moved slowly in a clockwise circle, piercing the night with an eerie, slow, two-note whistle - whistling being a largely forgotten way of calling the spirits. When he completed the circle, he stood facing the crowd and, in a strong voice which carried to those of us stood at the back, began to speak:

"Spirits of this place - spirits of land, of sky, spirits of sea, of cliff face and tree - spirits of this place, be our witness. Hear our hearts. Hear their quiet murmurs. On this day, at this time of the year, we stand on a cliff edge, on a precipice, looking into the dark..."

We were reminded that it is not just our ancestors who ask us to remember; so too do "the wise women, the witches, the cunning men, the keepers of the old ways" and the wild old gods of the land. We are called to acknowledge and remember not only our human ancestors but also our fellow creatures, "our wild cousins, our cousins who fly, our cousins who crawl, who are dying in their droves... those species who have breathed their last breath... and those who will not make it through this winter...". We were invited to make a simple ceremony of remembrance - whispering the name of a lost loved one, followed by the words "Ancestor, I honour you."

The speaker finished his moving address with a final few rousing cries of "Ancestors, we honour you!" and threw back his head in a ululation. The spell of silence was broken for a moment as many joined in with a cry or cheer, and then another spell was woven as the drumming and chanting began: "In my blood, in my bones, I hear your voice, I hear your call. Ancestors dance with me, ancestors chant with me, I hear your voice, I hear your call..."

That drumming and singing, pulsating and hypnotic, could have carried on for a long time, but after maybe five minutes someone managed to bring it to a close and the MC announced Beltane back into the circle for their Fire Dance. Each year they have a special guest stand in the middle of the circle during the dance; this time it was two young men who run an occult shop in New Orleans and had travelled all the way over here just for the Dark Gathering! Very cool. As was the dance.

Beltane rounded up the evening with a final dance called "Haccombe to Death" - in which they actually held aloft flaming torches, which was awesome - and then lined up to sing "Leave Her, Johnny", a sea shanty sung by crews prior to leaving a ship at the end of a voyage.

And that was it. Everyone dispersed, going indoors to get warm and eat. Somehow it felt so much later than 7pm. But the event had been wonderful, enjoyable, moving, meaningful, authentic and real, and I loved it!

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At 9pm, after a very welcome dinner of beef stew, we walked back down one last time to the Museum of Witchcraft & Magic. While there were signs of life spilling out from the pubs and hotels in the main area of the village, the dark and deserted harbour-front was a little disconcerting, the only noise being the rushing waters of the river. But the museum was open till 10pm especially for the Gathering. It was really interesting, albeit - due to the age of the building, the late hour and darkness outside, the low lighting inside, and some of the exhibits/information - a little creepy. I haven't been in there before, so I'm glad I had a chance.

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Weeeeell, I wasn't expecting to write so much about this, haha. Also, in case you were wondering, my memory is not this good. I've only been able to recall and write so much about the evening from reading the event organiser's blog post and looking at the photos and videos on there. If you'd like to see what some of it was like, someone put together a great video of the second half: https://youtu.be/4h7m-Ded1_g. It's long, but here are the start times for specific clips in the video if you want to look at any in particular:

• Procession: starts at the beginning
• Penkevyll, her Teazers, and the Mari Lwyds: starts at 05:00
• Pwnco Ceremony: starts at 06:20
• Stone Soup storytelling: starts at 08:15
• The Darkest Ooser: starts at 12:35 (skip to 14:55 to get a good close-up)
• Traveller's Prayer: starts at 15:40
• Calling the ancestors: starts at 17:15
• Ancestors chant: starts at 24:40
• Fire Dance: starts at 28:50
• Haccombe: starts at 33:20
• Leave Her Johnny: starts at 35:55

Alternatively, scroll through the two blog posts on the event website to see some good photos:
https://allhallowsgathering.com/2019/11/10/dark-gathering-2019-part-one/
https://allhallowsgathering.com/2019/11/18/dark-gathering-2019-part-two/

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The Dark Gathering was a brilliant way to end my trip down to Kernow. On the Sunday morning I was on a train again, homeward bound.

Cornwall, October 2019 - day 4

Friday 25th - Healey's Cyder Farm and Truro

It was my friend's day off, and we'd decided to spend the day at Healey's Cornish Cyder Farm, a small family-run cider producer near Truro. If you've had or heard of Rattler cider (I hadn't), it's made there. They have guided tours, cider tastings, tractor rides of the orchards, apple-pressing to make juice, a restaurant and a tea room, of course a shop, and as it was half-term week they also had a pumpkin patch. There can't be many more quintessentially autumnal things than going somewhere like that.

The visitor centre smelled of apples, and had stacks of multi-packed ciders and juices along the sides for sale. We were disappointed to be told that the pumpkin patch wasn't their own, the pumpkins had been brought in from elsewhere, and that it was really aimed at little kids, but it's good they were honest with us instead of letting us spend money on that particular tour which wouldn't have been worth it. Still, we booked ourselves onto the regular full guided tour, which was £20 for just under two hours, and lingered for 15 minutes in a little seating area, reading the boards about the farm's history, before the tour started at 12.

First stop was the Press House, one of the old buildings in the cobbled courtyard, to see the apple press, a fairly modern machine small and compact enough that you can stand at the finishing end and see whole apples going in at the start only a few metres away. The apples are rinsed as they're fed into it, then shredded, crushed and pulped to extract all the juice, which is then taken off via pipes to one of the numerous large silos outside. What remains, the dry apple pulp, is used for animal feed and farm fertiliser, so nothing is wasted. Here's a short video they made a few years ago showing the process, if you're interested: https://youtu.be/IUH1NELFalY. During harvest season, the press runs for up to 16 hours each day, and it takes around two days to fill one of the 50,000-litre silos, in which the juice is fermented.

The apple press

Next was the Jam Kitchen, where just a couple of people at a time make all of Healey's preserves by hand, getting around 80 jars from a single batch. They had a jar of every item in the range on the counter in front of the kitchen, for sampling, but we didn't get to sample them at that point as there were too many people in the group and it would have taken ages, so the tour guide suggested we come back later if we wanted to try any.

The museum, in the old barn, was interesting, with a number of big old traditional presses dating from the 15th to the 19th centuries, and the tour guide explaining the history and progression of cider-making. Some of it has you grimacing at the, well, grimness. With donkey-drawn presses, the apple pulp that was pushed out of the bowl by the moving wheel had to be scooped up off the ground and put back in - meaning all sorts of nasties were also put into the tray and mixed in with the pulp. In the mid-17th century, many makers started using lead, either as a sweetener in the finished cider, or to line the juice-collecting trays with lead so that the juice wouldn't soak into the wood; around the same time, a mysterious "colic" became very widespread, and it was over a hundred years before someone figured out that it was lead poisoning. But in general, alcoholic beverages were safer to drink than water, simply because the water used to make them had been boiled and so the germs killed. Many farmers used to pay their seasonal labourers at least partly with cider, and the best cider-makers got the best workers. The museum also had a little corner made up to be like a cooper's workshop, the craft of the cooper - the barrel-maker - being one of many traditional skills that are fading.

Old apple presses in the museum

After the museum was the distillery, where they make a small range of spirits. I can't remember any info about that, but it was interesting. Next was down into the chilly, dimly-lit, barrel-stacked cellar, where they had a little bar set up and gave each of us a really cute little mini glass tankard only about 5cm tall with a smiley face embossed on the bottom. All of the several samples were nice - ranging from a few types of modern cider, to brandy, to elderflower wine, to a new limited-edition pineapple cider - but I preferred the traditional scrumpy. I was sad that only the children were offered samples of the apple (and apple-and-rhubarb) juice, but I wasn't brave enough to ask for some. The guide pointed out some little black spots on some of the wooden beams and explained that it was caused by the evaporating fumes from the barrels, and eventually the beams would all be covered, would all be black.

The barrel cellar

We were taken back to the visitor centre, where the tour guide opened up the door in the big barrel-vat installation which makes up part of the front of the building. Inside was a staircase winding upwards around an actual modern vat, and at the top of that was a walkway, from which you can look down at the goings-on in the storage and distribution warehouse and then the production plant, where all the drinks are bottled and packaged. It was cool. There were information boards around, explaining the whole production process from orchard to bottle, and some other things as well which I can't remember. I should have taken pictures of more than just the first one, it would have been interesting to remember and write about. The tour guide let us wander round for a while, watching the happenings below and reading the boards, then called us back to a little counter in one of the corners, where she had set up two sets of those tiny little plastic sampling cups full of apple juice, from two different varieties of apples. She explained that juices often need to be mixed together so that the end product has a nice balanced taste, instead of being a tad too sour or dry or sweet. When we had tasted half of each cup of juice, she told us to pour the juice from one cup into the other so they were mixed together, and try that. While the individual juices on their own had been fine, the mixed one was definitely nicer, you could tell the difference.

The tour finished with a tractor-trailer ride through the orchards, which was nice. There was interesting commentary, but I can't remember any of it and there isn't much information on their website I can use to tell you about the orchards.

Fallen apples in one of the orchards

By this point it was nearly 2:30pm, and high time for lunch. We went to The Old Bottlery restaurant, a really nice, bright, dog-friendly space with a huge old barrel-vat for a bar and a wood-burning stove in the centre. The table next to the fire was of course already occupied so we sat at a table near the counter, away from the door. The place was maybe half-full, not quiet but not busy either, happily. My friend opted for a cream tea, which included two enormous homemade scones, while I found exactly the sort of thing I was hoping for in a cyder-roasted ham and homemade-appleslaw sandwich, the filling almost overflowing from between slices of proper thick-cut locally-made wholegrain bread. Plus, as part of the tour, we'd been given a voucher for a free drink in the restaurant and I used mine to get a bottle of their apple juice. All was yum! :) It'd be a great place to go for a Sunday roast, too.

Ham and appleslaw sandwich

Next and final stop was the shop. While the scrumpy had been nice, and they sold small flagons of it and the cute mini tankards, and they also sold nice fruit wines like strawberry, I knew I wouldn't drink all of anything I bought. So I headed instead for the preserves section, and immediately wished I'd gone back to the jam kitchen to sample some things before coming to the shop. They have a range of 25 different preserves and, although I was definitely going to buy some marmalade, there were several others which sounded good and I knew they'd all be great quality. In the end I went for plum jam, as I'll always remember how delicious the plum jam I helped make on the farm in Canada was. I was a bit disappointed the next day, when spooning some of the jam out onto some toast, to find that the plums were whole (minus stones) so actually it wouldn't spread very much or last very long, and it wasn't as delicious and flavoursome as my Canadian one. Oh well. The marmalade is perfect :)

Leaving Healey's, we headed towards Truro, Cornwall's county town, administrative and retail centre, and only city. The drive through the winding country lanes was an autumn extravaganza. There were trees everywhere, mostly beeches, and the colours were stunning. The earlier rain meant that everything was now glinting and glimmering in the liquid gold of the setting sun, beautifully contrasted against the darkened tarmac and tree trunks and richly-coloured leaves and the lingering slate-grey clouds :)

It started raining again when we got there. I hadn't been there before and knew nothing about it; it seems like a nice place and I'd like to visit it properly one day. I liked the old buildings, wishing (as I always do) that I could see them as they were in their original time, without the concrete and roads and cars and modern stuff. We happened across the cathedral - didn't even know the place had one - and ducked inside out of the rain, and wandered around for a while. I love places like that, peaceful and quiet and architecturally beautiful. There was a little exhibition on there, too, about climate change and eco-responsible lifestyles and what local groups are doing, which I liked.

Once my friend had bought what she needed to, it was late afternoon and the shops were starting to close, and it was still raining, so we couldn't stay and explore. Will have to go back another time!

Inside Truro Cathedral

Cornwall, October 2019 - days 1 to 3

Tuesday 22nd - Southampton to Bodmin

I went down to Cornwall to visit one of my friends, who now lives near Tintagel (of King Arthur legend) on the county's north coast. It took five hours to travel down on the train, with three changes at Westbury, Taunton, and Plymouth, and I spent pretty much the whole time gazing out of the window at the sunlit countryside. There weren't many other passengers so it was nice and quiet for the whole journey, and the trains themselves, Great Western Railway ones, were fairly new so were nice and clean and comfortable. I liked that they had little lights above the seats, lit red or green to show which were reserved or available, which you could see along the whole length of the carriage from the door, so you could see at a glance instead of wandering up and down looking at each individual seat. At GWR stations, they also announce over the tannoys which carriages are the reserved ones. I wish South Western Railway and Cross Country would do both those things, it makes it so much quicker and easier to find somewhere to sit.

...Well that was a boring first paragraph, I'm sure, hahaha!

The stretch between Dawlish and Teignmouth was particularly lovely; the track goes right along the seafront so you're just looking out at the sea, in this case flat calm sea and blue sky :) I arrived at Bodmin Parkway just before five-thirty and my friend's dad picked me up from the station, as she was still at work. The drive through the Cornish countryside to where they live near Camelford was lovely, the setting sun throwing an absolutely stunning and beautiful copper-gold light on everything. Sausage casserole and mash for dinner was very welcome, and my friend got home from work late evening.

Looking out the train window at the Cornish countryside

Wednesday 23rd - The Camel Trail and Padstow

My friend was working on the Wednesday and Thursday so I'd planned some things to do. The Wednesday was forecast to be the nicer day weather-wise, so I decided to do the Camel Trail that day - a 17-mile / 28km recreational path (walking, cycling, horse-riding) on the route of a former railway line between Wenfordbridge, Bodmin, Wadebridge, and Padstow. The name is from the Camel River (kammel is Cornish for "crooked") which it follows, though the Camel Valley between Bodmin and Wadebridge, and then the Camel Estuary between Wadebridge and Padstow. I was dropped off at a point on the trail near Bodmin and spent about an hour and a half walking happily to Wadebridge. It was dry and sunny and the perfect blend of warmth and autumnal coolness. The valley is wooded and of course the leaves were gorgeous colours, and I picked up a handful of fallen sweet chestnuts to take home and roast, using my boots to pry apart the prickly cases. Many of the former station platforms along the route are still there, but the only one still in use is Boscarne Junction, from which runs a small heritage line; there was a lovely old steam train just turning around when I passed it. It was half term week, so although it wasn't super busy and I spent most of my time without anyone else in sight, it was never too long before you'd see someone else briefly.

An old station in the lovely wooded Camel Valley section

The entire length of the path was paved and completely flat, so I decided to hire a bike in Wadebridge. I haven't cycled in years, because going up the slightest incline is really tough when you're not used to it and don't practice. But I enjoy it when it's flat or downhill. It was so lovely! The waters of the estuary reflected the blue of the sky, the fluffy clouds, and the gently rolling low hills and harvested fields stretching either side. And it only took about 40 minutes to reach Padstow, I got there about quarter to three. I left my bike at a special cycle-park area at the end of the trail, and wandered along the waterfront towards the harbour. There were some retail units in a converted warehouse and I had a look in the shoe shop, which was a mistake because I found a really nice (and actually comfortable) pair of navy blue heeled ankle boots which I didn't let myself buy because I don't know how often I'd wear them. Just along from the shoe shop was was Rick Stein's Fish & Chips, from which I got a late lunch of battered cod and chips. I wish I'd got the grilled mackerel instead, though, as you can get battered cod anywhere. There was a deli too but I didn't really have time to go in - plus, I would have been tempted by things in there, too, haha. I got the fish 'n' chips to take away and ate it while walking round the harbour and up through the park overlooking the estuary to the WWI memorial at St Saviours Point. I sat on a bench there to finish eating but it was in the shade and a bit chilly, so I was glad to get back out in the sunshine again.

The Camel Estuary from the Camel Trail

The Camel Estuary from St Saviour's Point in Padstow

I only had time to go a little bit further along the path before having to turn back, as I needed to get the bike back to Wadebridge no later than 5:30pm. I'll have to look up flat cycle routes and bike hire, both locally and on future trips, as I really enjoyed it. While I was disappointed to not be able to stay in Padstow a bit longer - I hadn't been able to look round the little cobbled streets of the town at all, or go further along the coast path - it turned out to be a good thing as the last bus from Wadebridge back was shortly after 5:30, which I hadn't realised. Maybe they go on a bit later during the summer. It was dark by the time the bus reached Camelford, and my friend lives a little way outside the village on a country lane, but thankfully the bus stops there too. Nobody was in but the little annex had been left unlocked for me so I watched telly in there, and flicked through some of my friend's witchy books, while waiting for my hosts to return from their dog walk. We had cheese on toast for dinner, and again my friend got back late evening.

Thursday 24th - Bude

My friend didn't start work till 12, so in the morning she took me and the dogs to Trebarwith Strand, a small beach nestled between steep cliffs at the end of a narrow valley. The tide was in and I'm not confident walking over slippery rocks so I mostly just stood in one spot watching the awesome Atlantic waves, and the few brave people trying to surf, while the dogs got some exercise. We didn't stay too long before heading back to the house to get ready to go back out, she to work and me up to the seaside resort town of Bude. When a bus comes only every two hours and is late, you begin to question whether you might have missed it, even if you were at the bus stop several minutes before it was due. But thankfully it did arrive, and I enjoyed an hour's trip looking out at the windblown and largely treeless coastal countryside. We got stuck for 10 or so minutes coming out of Boscastle, though, the bus coming face-to-face with several cars going the other way on a single-track road with no passing place within easy reach.

The canal at Bude

I went first to Bude's Tourist Information Centre to have a quick look at what I might be able to do with my few hours there, and bought myself a little box of shortbread, then went across the road to get some lunch. The town has a canal going down to the sea, and there were some retail and eatery units in the old wharf buildings; one of the places I'd seen recommended online, The Olive Tree, was one of them, so I went there. It was sunny and warm enough that I sat outside, and ordered their Superfood Buddha Bowl of quinoa, smoky roasted cauliflower, carrot, edamame beans, pickled cabbage, Chinese leaf, toasted almonds, and a lemon and tahini dressing, with some smoked mackerel. Yum! :)

Superfood Buddha Bowl at The Olive Tree in Bude

Bude Canal and Summerleaze Beach

After lunch I followed the canal down to the end, where it met the sea. The beach was on the opposite shore, and I would have needed to go back up to the road by the TIC and back down the other side to reach it. There were quite a few people on it, a few dozen maybe, half of them surfing. The tide was in and it had clouded over more by this point so the water looked dark and cold and uninviting, and the wind was chilly. I put my scarf and beanie on, crossed the canal's sea lock and walked out a little way onto the breakwater, but its gently-sloping sides meant that the breaking surf was easily stretching up to reach the path and, well, I didn't want to get my shoes wet, haha. Being only a few metres away from and on a level with the pounding waves - as opposed to on a clifftop overlooking it from a distance - was a little unnerving, a reminder of how small we humans are in the face of the raw energy and power of the ocean. And this was probably a pretty calm day compared to what it can be like. I'd love to see it in a storm. I do have an admiration (and a little envy) of those who have salt in their veins - the lifeboat crews, fishermen, sailors, surfers: their deep understanding of, connection to, and ability to work with the forces of nature that are the sea and the wind, the tides and the weather.

I went back and turned to go up onto the cliff path, and reached the little tower a few minutes later. Clearly Victorian and made of local sandstone, it was octagonal and had the directions/compass points carved into the top of each side. I've tried to find out what it was, but it seems nobody's completely sure; it's referred to as both Compass Point and the Storm Tower, and some people think it was just an ornamental folly, while others think it was a coastguard watchtower. I'm inclined to go with the former. You could also see lots of big satellite dishes on the clifftops a few miles north. Turns out that's a government satellite ground station and eavesdropping centre, haha...

On the breakwater

I didn't get particularly far in my clifftop walk, maybe only a few hundred metres; I kept stopping and gazing out at the views - the shifting light over land and sea, the steel-blue and slate-grey waters of the Atlantic, the waves rolling in with a roar, the shadowy silhouettes of the cliffs stretching away to the southwest, the sunlit ones to the north, the double rainbow that appeared over the town. I have no interest in people-watching, but nature-watching I can happily do for a long while.

Looking southwest from the clifftop

A rainbow over the view to the north

I could have gone a bit further and possibly reached a point where I could see over Widemouth Bay, the large beach a few miles south of the town, but I wasn't sure how long it would take me to get back to the bus stop, so I turned around a little sooner than I wished. The tide had receded when I got back down to the sea-lock, and the little footbridge that connected it to the beach was no longer underwater. I wandered back up the canal and continued along it past the TIC for a few minutes, before the path branched off in different directions and I turned back to make my way to the bus stop.

I had the song Cousin Jack by Show of Hands in my head on the journey back. It's a beautiful but sad tribute to the Cornish miners who emigrated because there was no more work in their own land, their ways of life and language were disappearing. In many ways, especially away from the tourist hubs, Cornwall is still a very deprived region. Give it a listen: https://youtu.be/wgyRWKLkxvE

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Days four, five, and six to follow later this week :)

Some favourite books

A little while ago there was a "challenge" doing the rounds on Facebook, in which, each day for seven days, someone posts a picture of the front cover of a book that's meaningful or influential for them (no words or explanation, just the picture), tags a friend in each post and then the friend has to do it. I wasn't nominated, thankfully, but I do love reading and I thought it would be a nice idea for a shortish blog post. But I can only think of a few books that I could maybe consider influential to me personally, so I'm just going to list some of my favourites (those "influential" ones among them), and I will put a little explanation. And I'm not sticking to just seven, that's far too difficult, haha. So here you go, in no particular order!

Non-fiction:

• Seasons of the Sacred Earth: Following the Old Ways on an Enchanted Homestead, Cliff Seruntine. The author lives with his wife and daughters on a secluded homestead in Nova Scotia, and the book is a series of beautiful accounts of daily life through the seasons. They make a point to live gently on the land and honour the spirits of nature, and have a deep understanding of, connection with, and respect for the natural world. I love it, it's wonderful, and I want their life.
• The New Good Life, John Robbins. An examination of the prevailing money-centred and consumerist culture, and an alternative better life. Written by the son of an American millionaire, who refused his father's fortune and went off to build a tiny wooden cabin and grow his own food, and live a simple life based around values of connection to nature and people.
• Utopia for Realists, Rutger Bregman. A proposal for reconstructing modern society to promote a more productive and equitable life for everybody, with practical ideas and examples of where they are or have been already trialed in places across the world. The core ideas are introducing Universal Basic Income, a 15-hour work week, and open borders.
• Feral, George Monbiot. About rewilding, and how letting nature take its course in some of our landscapes (rather than heavily manage it as we do now) - and, crucially, reintroducing predators we have lost - would be beneficial to the land, wildlife, and humans. Written by an environmentalist and journalist I admire greatly.
• Goddesses in Everywoman, Jean Shinoda Bolen. A classic book on female psychology, which uses seven Greek goddesses as archetypes to explain patterns of behaviour and personality traits in women. Basically every woman has one she identifies most strongly with, and it helps you understand yourself and others more. For me it was Hestia, and it was a sort of 'eureka' moment where it was the first time I felt it was okay to be a quiet, introverted, homely person and that there are others out there like me. There's also a Gods in Everyman.

Fiction:

• The Famous Five series, Enid Blyton. I haven't read these for many years, but I absolutely loved them when I was younger; basically it's a group of kids running round the countryside having adventures.
• Circle of Three series, Isobel Bird. A series of 13 books aimed at teens, about three American high school girls from different social cliques who go through a year and a day study in Wicca, or modern witchcraft. I came across them when I was 12, and they gave me a word to encompass everything I'd loved since childhood, and started my fascination with and love of paganism.
• The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame. I didn't read this till I was 19, which is a shame; it's a classic for good reason. It's just lovely, full of idyllic pastoral English scenes and animal-characters having adventures.
• Anne of Green Gables (and sequels Anne of Avonlea, Anne of the Island, and Anne of Windy Poplars), Lucy Maud Montgomery. Another set of stories I wish I'd known when I was younger; I didn't read these till I was 21. Lovely, idyllic, country/village-life stories of a very imaginative and spirited girl in rural Canada. The 1980s TV-films starring Megan Follows, and the recent Netflix series "Anne with an E", are great adaptations.
• The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley. A fantasy novel, kind of epic; a feminist and pagan retelling of the Arthurian legends, from the point of view of the women.
• Persuasion, Jane Austen. This has grown on me each time I've read it and is now my favourite Austen novel. I don't really have the words to explain why. It's her most moving work. The protagonist Anne Elliot is the eldest of Austen's heroines at 27, the age I am at the moment, and the novel has a more mature feel to it than the others. Many of the literary techniques used were unusual or new for the time, and tell the story in a more internal way, through thoughts and feelings and subtle wordless interactions, rather than through action, and the ending is one of the most romantic in English literature.
• The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. Just utterly delightful and charming and funny and lovely, written as letters between the characters.

Of course there are so many books I've read that I've loved or found fascinating and haven't included. Maybe I'll think of some other post to write about some of them one day. But for now, I hope this has sparked some interest, and some of you will go out and give one or two of these books a read yourself :)

Currently reading: The Night Angel Trilogy, Brent Weeks