After packing BOXY with all the toys and kit we were going to need for a week in the wild west of Cornwall we were on the road not long after nine. Travelling down on a Monday before the school holidays means very little traffic so after a slow relaxing drive we stopped off in Portreath for a late breakfast. The waves were non-existent and the weather was more like October than June :( We took shelter in a cafe by the car-park and ordered a fry up and a coffee. A few other potential tourists wandered across the car-park to look at the view but the village was really quiet considering it was June.
We decided to head off to Penzance to stock up on a few extra supplies and a quick walk up and down the high street. By the time we got there the weather had got worse and it had even started to rain a bit. The high point of the stop was seeing a seal down near the lido. We ran out the two hour ticket we had paid for in the car-park before heading off again. We actually drove down to Land's End but decided the £4 they wanted just to park wasn't really worth it. If we really wanted to see Land's End again we could always walk in from somewhere on the Coast Path. By now it was after three o'clock so we headed to the campsite. We had never stayed at Treen Farm before but the reviews on the net sounded good. To be honest it wasn't as good as I'd expected. The field we stayed in didn't have any divisions between the pitches other than a wooden picnic table. We set up in one corner on our own, but by the time we left there was a tent about 15 feet in front of BOXY's sliding door and it was a little bit claustrophobic. Other than that the site & the facilities were fine. The best thing about the site was that it was only a few minutes walk to the coast path. Once we'd had a brew and set our camp up we went exploring. The weather had started to clear a bit and the views from the coast path were pretty impressive. We headed east up to the logan stone. We climbed out on to the headland but couldn't find any stones that rocked. On the way back we watched a few Gannets stuka bombing into the sea after fish. Then we saw a few crows chasing what looked like a peregrine that had a small crow in its claws. The crows forced it out over the sea where it decided to drop its lunch and then out-run its pursuers. We found another footpath back to the campsite and headed back for tea and an early night.
Day 2 - Coastal Walk - Treen to Nanjizal
We woke up on Tuesday morning to a sea mist which was thick enough to hide Porthcurno down the coast. We had already decided to spend the day walking west towards Porthgwarra and Nanjizal. The mist didn't really thin out much all day which was a pity because the views would have been spectacular. The path is really up and down so the first two or three miles felt more like double that. At Porthgwarra we stopped for a cup of tea and a pasty in the cafe. While we were there a dive boat came in and moored up in the cove. This led to the surreal scene of a table full of people dressed in drysuits sitting around a picnic table in the cafe's tea garden. Our next planned stop was Nanjizal but the path didn't get any easier so we stopped a couple of times to catch breath on the way. When we finally got to Nanjizal we took off our boots and had a cooling paddle in the sea. We'd squirreled away a slice of apple & cinnamon crumble at Porthgwarra so we had that while a seal watched us from the surf. According to the OS map there were a lot of footpaths leading inland from Nanjizal across the farmland to Treen. The mist hadn't thinned out so we wouldn't be missing anything by taking the "easy" route instead of following the coast path back the way we'd come. It turned out that the footpaths on the map didn't really indicate what they'd be like on the ground. The first mile or two cut through cow fields, potato fields and a couple of farm yards, so weren't too bad. Then the path sort of disappeared? We wandered around trying to pick it up and finally ended up finding a sign-post pointing in the right direction. The path it pointed to was just a bit over-grown. The mix of stinging nettles, brambles and shorts made it particularly painful. Eventually we emerged into another potato field and then onto a country road. My girlfriend wanted to find another track across farmland to Treen but I pulled rank and we kept to the tarmac until we reached the campsite. The whole walk was just over eight miles but felt a lot longer. We'd certainly earned our early night.
The weather was still cloudy on Wednesday. After yesterday's walk we decided to have a lazy day. We packed up and drove across to Sennen for a day on the beach. My girlfriend had wanted to have breakfast in the cafe above the beach but it wasn't open when we got there. We walked down into the village and had a fry up sitting on the front by the lifeboat station instead. The promised sunshine was still AWOL but we unloaded our beach gear and found a spot on the sand surround by a wind break of huge granite rocks. The sun did break through now and again and the wind had whipped up a few reasonable looking waves. I left my girlfriend reading her book and had a splash around for an hour or two. To be honest the waves were a bit small and weak but it felt good to be in the sea instead of tramping around the coast.
We headed for Gwithian after four o'clock. The site was quite busy but the pitches always give you plenty of room. We even pitched our awning this time. Just as we finished pegging it out the fish & chip van drove up. It seemed silly to ignore it so we had cod & chips and beer sitting at the table in the awning. After tea we had a stroll through the dunes to the beach to walk off some of the chips before turning in.
The weather forecast had said there would be rain & showers all day, but it didn't look too bad when we got up. We managed to disconnect Boxy from the awning and drove over to the National Trust car-park in the dunes. My girlfriend went for a walk along the coast while I went body-boarding. The wind over-night had managed to whip up some half-decent waves, but not good enough ones to mean that too many people were in the water. We rendezvoused back at Boxy around one o'clock before driving up the coast to Hell Mouth. The cliffs are a couple of hundred feet high and as usual you can stand as close to the edge as you feel brave enough to. The usual gaggle of assorted seabirds were riding the updrafts coming up the cliff. I tried to explain to my girlfriend how to tell the difference between petrels & seagulls but she wasn't really listening. I think she had gotten distracted by the grey streaked sky that looked very much like an approaching rain shower. We walked back along the cliff top and got back to the van just as the first rain drops started spotting the windscreen. As the rain looked set to get worse we drove back to the campsite and quickly connected ourselves back to the awning. The rain carried on being wet and noisy for a couple of hours so I killed time by reading a book and searching the larder for something interesting for tea. My girlfriend veto'd my plan of adding a tin of tomatoes to a chicken curry so we made do with "plain" curry. I think before our next trip away I'm going to visit Lidl and stock up with the most bizarre European tinned products I can find.
By about six o'clock the weather had cleared again so we went for a walk down to the beach. I decided to try out my Trago Mills green wellies for the first time. They were suprisingly comfortable and waterproof, right up until I stood in the sea and a not so small wave broke over the top of them. Doh! At least it wasn't too far to walk back to Boxy. Back in the van we made the most of the hook-up & watched TV
Day 5 - Journey Home
Friday morning dawned breezy and cloudy. The wind had dried out the awning so we quickly packed it away in case a shower got it wet again. We decided to take the scenic route home along the north coast. The first stop was Perranporth. The car park on the sea front has got a height restriction barrier that Boxy can't fit under so we drove up to Droskye Point where you can park for free for an hour. We walked back down into the town and did a quick cruise up and down the high street. Given the choice of food on offer we let ourselves down by choosing a cheese and ham roll each from the Dolphin Cafe. On the plus side we did eat them back in the van with the view of the whole bay in front of us.
We carried on along the coast, checking out the waves at each beach we drove past. I'd though I'd convinced my girlfriend to and chase a few waves but when we got to Harlyn she had decided she wanted to stay dry. As the waves at Harlyn were tiny we carried on a few more miles to Trevone. We'd walked around Trevone on the coast path a few times but we'd never actually been on the beach. As the sun was trying to make an appearance I decided to put on my still wet, wetsuit and go boarding, and my girlfriend chilled out in the van. After about an hour in the water I'd had enough and came back in. Before we left we walked out along the headland to take some arty photos. By the time we'd walked back to the van it was after five o'clock so finally we pointed Boxy towards home and escaped from the Duchy before we found another campsite to stay in.
