Hike to Porthallow
June 18, 2000 Sunday
Started off today saying "good-bye" to all the guests at the B&B. There were several older couples there who had been very enjoyable to converse with and the two Austrian couples that mostly kept to themselves.
Had an enjoyable ride over to Manaccan from Helston. the man driving the taxi was born in a cottage in Manaccan, but he lives in Helston now. His children are grown but also live in Helston with their families. He said he'd been working for the same boss for 28 years, but had not been provided with a retirement plan. His insurance plan wasn't accumulating value and now to find out the pension he was buying into was probably going to be deducted from his state pension, so he would have been just as well off without. Sounds like an awful predicament, but I've got no guarantee of Social security myself, so it's not so different.
Started off down a path behind a lovely little churchyard. Had to double back a couple of times, but I'm finding my way pretty well. Met a couple of German hikers who have been travelling around the coast for 8 days now. Started out in St. Ives. They helped a bit with directions and I kept saying "bitte" for thank you, come to realize a few moments after parting ways that "danke' is the "thank you' and 'bitte' is you're welcome. Stupid yank. The paths through the woods have been lovely. Temperature is a bit cool now, but usually it gets hottest here around three o'clock. Now is noonish. Am currently resting in a lovely bay near Flushing. Got to get along ow over to Trewarnevas for lunch.
Another very pleasant couple on the beach there. Suggested I read "Serum" by Rutherford and "A time for gifts" by Patrick Lee Ferber. He is a Family Practice Lawyer. She's from Kent & he's from London.
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What an absolutely spectacular view this is. I'm at Nare's Point where they had an Allied decoy during WWII. The ocean is as blue as I've ever seen. Walking along this path has been a bit of an adventure. The cliff is steep, the path is narrow, and brush catches me from either side. It's hard to believe there's something on the other side of this ocean, looking out there. Cattle have been all along the path and from the remains it looks like they've been in the path as well. Some of the places along the way have been trellised over with vines, but this area is open to see the sea. Every moment here feels like I'm in fairy country. I need to collect some of these wildflowers There are clover & dandelions, but also a fair number of those I'm not familiar with.
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Yay! Finally got to Porthallow. It was actually a shorter first leg than yesterday was, but took a lot longer due to the stopping I did and the hills. Hit lots of briars but part of that is due to me taking a lot of the cow path vs the people path. These people seem to have a harder time understanding my accent, but part of that is probably due to the strong influence of the Cornish language for so long down here. They don't get a lot of Americans down here in hte fishing coves and few enough people on holiday. They are very polite, but I think I confuse them with the way I speak. It's a good thing I speak with a pretty clear accent, otherwise they'd think I was French or something. I'd think most of the people who come down here must go straight for the path because the town is virtually deserted, but for locals.
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Yesterday's beach was pebble - today's is barnacle. All I want to do is just lay here and listen to the waves coming in against the shore. I'm laying just above where a stream is trickling through a drain pipe, so I have two sounds of water working against each other. The sun is warm and the breeze is cool. The sky is only a shade lighter blue than the ocean or I would think they were not two separate bodies, but rather one continuous pool. Sailboats are everywhere and the Cornish coastline ribbons around, fading into the blue lazy distance. If I were a monarch, I would have put a castle on any one of these points, jetting out into the sea. I haven't seen much in the way of caves, other than the man-made mines that have been along the trails occasionally.
For food, there's been a sandwich shop in every town, but I'm taking a lesson from yesterday and wrapping up half of my ham sandwich for dinner. Who knows if they keep food shops open on Sunday evenings here.
Oh, and all I desire is to but stay here listening and feeling for the whole rest of the day. The ocean is evocative. Why should I ever wish to return home when I have the ocean to seduce me from responsibilities and expectations of myself & others? What a simple place to be - surrounded by other barnacles who have fixed themselves to this very same rock. Why not be like them? Stone-like in this simple place.
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I never realized how differently different beaches can sound. In addition to the sound of waves as they come up the shore, there is the sound of the gravel as it is pulled back toward the sea. There is a lovely cove near Trevockan B&B where the beach is neither sand nor pebble, but stone cobble. These are more like granite from a mounttain that has been incinerated. It is rather unpleasant to walk on & I would advise sim shoes of some sort if you're ever to try swimming here. I stood out in the surf with my bare feet and had them pummelled by the stones in the receeding surf, not to mention the soles of my poor feet being abused as I made my way back to my bag. It is a good surf & there are people with boogie boards taking advantage of it.
The trek from Porhallow to St. Keverne would have been more pleasant if I hadn't gotten immediately lost by taking the wrong path. met some nice folks along the way who were not from Cornwall & spoke very good London English.
Damn - why is it every time I set down to write the tide comes in farther to make a nusance of itself?
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The B&B in St. Keverne is overflowing with flowers. There is a single white rose in the middle of the garden that draws my particular attention. There are other roses, but for some reason it seems particularly placed. I haven't met any of the other guests here. It seems like they're having a family gathering or something. I would go dine out in a pub, I'm not in the mood to walk another mile after having been lost today. I'm just lazy.
Funny thing I wonder about here in England. Seems like the man's often handsomer than his wife. But when I see dating couples it seems to be the other way around. I wonder if that's also true in the states because I hadn't noticed.
Funny thing - I've seen more cattle on this journey than sheep. And on this farm they're raising Pigs. There were a lot of sheep in Salisbury, though.
I love the birds here Many sparrows, homing pigeons (or some kind of pigeon), all sorts I don't recognize.
Old Englanders (Londoners) are very much like old Virginians. Very proper, very polite.
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It must be very American of me to want to eat everything that's put in front of me, even if I'm full. Mrs. Rita Kelly cooked the most marvellous dinner here tonight - Roast beef, cabbage, leeks, carrots, potatoes, and for desert this banana & pear pudding with rum bread at the bottom and meringue crusty at the top. I feel perfectly awful for not remembering the name of it. The older couple next to me gave me a small glass of their wine to go with my dinner - I think it was an Australian Cabernet. The Australian part I'm sure of. We all had a lovely dinner conversation about the area, WW2, Virginia's native American population befre English habitation. It's so much fun because we all have things to learn from each other. I found out that the beautiful black & white bird I've been seeing everywhere is the Magpie, and I also found out that their pretty little off-yellow finch is called the green finch.
Everyone seems to be rather appauled by the idea of iced tea, which is a real shame. The English love their tea. Gentleman here explained to me what a "pasty" is. Funny, I thought it was a kind of pastry, but turns out it's really more like a pot pie. And apparently there's no such thing as a Cornish pasty (pasti??) unless it's made in Cornwall. Also, it's pronounced pah-stee, not pay-stie. I'd always thought it was the second.
My room here is done up in green the way the last one way in yellow. I'm reminded of how a proper little girl's room would look. All frills & flowers. Well, I've already made a proper pig stye out of it. Got my second bag in today, so now I have change of underwear, socks, and simsuits. All good things. I washed out my undies and socks in Salisbury, but i was certainly due clean ones. I'll repack everything into my bag before I leave. Should be fun getting that through the Tube in London. Ah well. First thing's first - at least I can roll it around the world instead of lugging it everywhere.
Got a nice complement from one of the guests here. On initially meeting me he said I don't 'sound American.' Haven't geen trying to 'sound Brittish' but I still take it as a complement - coming from a Sussex native.
I'm currently a bit sunburnt. I wore block second half of yesterday & all today, but I mut have sweated off today's layer. I'll be properly bronzed by the time I get back, but it will be multi-colored bronze and not the nubile beach-comber look.
I'm tired so easily here lately. Don't know why my body wants to wake up early except maybe because the sun is up at 4am, but I keep wanting to go to sleep by 8pm. Then I lay tossing in bed for an hour or two before I actually go to sleep. It's awful.
Tried checking the scales in the bathroom for my weight. On the top it says 105 and at the bottom it says 165. Now I know one is KG & the other is supposedly lbs, but I know I haven't gained 20 lbs and I know I haven't lost 50 lbs, so I'm not sure how at all to read the silly hing. Maybe it's the rose colored bathroom - makes everything seem so much better than it really is.
OK - off to the yellow book for tomorrow! <had run out of space in the first journal - gold covery with a pre-Rafaellite painting of a girl alseep in a luch flowerbed near a stream.
<desert was a Trifle and I don't think I noted - this B&B smelled completely like lavender>
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