Mirages of Leaves in Spring: Cornwall

The route I followed was more or less the ‘toe’ of West Cornwall; looks small on a map, but as a walked loop felt pretty dramatic, with each day offering a differing terrain.

8/10/2024 Day 1: Hayle- Gurnard’s Head (roughly). Approx. 15 miles

Zoom

Barely slept on the overnight coach from Bristol. A bit of an uncomfortable seat yes, but more that there were a crazy amount of beeps and alerts. What did they all mean? A trio of lads who’d spent all day coming back from Bangface (very “yes mate no mate yeah nah mate nah yeah mate”) Rob at the wheel- seemed a sweet guy.

Begin walking out of Hayle in the dark, with the sun rising over the south quay. The rain started before I got to Carbis Bay. A few ups-and-downs in terms of elevation, but mostly maintained path and steps.

Looking back towards the Hayle estuary & the rain clouds approaching.

As I hide from the rain off a road near Carbis Bay, an autistic man carrying a body board very angry with the rain comes shouting down the hill; “I’m sorry but I’m really cross! Can’t get the laundry dry like this! It’s running the bills up!” He softened, and apologised very heartfeltly. I felt he deserved nice weather to dry his laundry. Later as I walked back up the rise at Porthminster point I could hear him shouting as he got in the sea.

Feel this stretch between Hayle and St.Ives was characterised by a huge amount of people walking their dogs- almost all spaniels to a one.

The sun emerged from the clouds for long enough to entice me to a swim at Porthminster beach in St. Ives, and then it began raining as soon as I’d got out. Had two coffees and a pastry in St. Ives, and marched out past Barnoon cemetery and properly into a rugged coastline.

Here the path becomes much wilder, away from the settled stretch of coast Hayle- St. Ives. This time of year (October) the bracken die off has left the headlands and coastline an excellent shade of rusty red against the azure sea. A strong Westerly wind coming in unchallenged from the Atlantic. First filter water top-up at a spring near Zawn Quoits, though I worry with all the rain that it may be mixed with agricultural run-off etc.

Have lunch near Economy Cove looking out at the Carracks, a collection of rocks in the sea. Watch two seals. Saw one in the sea early in the day from Porthminster Point bobbing in the sea. Will also see many, many ponies in conservation grazing across the areas of the Coast Path maintained by the National Trust.

Stone circle near Zennor.

The rain really picks up and I am scrambling from headland to headland, the path winding up, around, and down with each ripple in the coastline. Despite my soaking wet feet I’m still in awe of the dramatic crashing waves and beauty around me. Pass an unsigned stone circle, no idea if ancient or modern. Drawn like a magnet to the Tinner’s Arms in Zennor, to shelter, call my girlfriend, have a pint- and then, as I was enjoying the dry still, a coffee too. My walking shoes, already a more ‘trainer’-esque design, had been thoroughly used for over a year, and now the many large stones on the path had exacerbated the holes already there. If I could change a single thing about this whole trip it would be my choice in footwear. I idly wonder if I’ll pass a shoe shop while drinking my pint. While sheltering, my resolve to wild camp faltered a bit; relentless, changeable weather accompanied by an ever-present westerly wind, hard terrain in the stretch St. Ives- Zennor, and residual exhaustion from the overnight coach journey all addled me. Still, once back out in it, I persisted.

Weather eased off around 3/4pm. Was advised on a place to camp by a fisherman from Treen, a sheltered spot somewhere on Gurnard’s Head, but ended up carrying on for a small stretch and camping on the other side of Gurnard’s Head on a hidden outctop at Zawn Duel (I think.) Set up camp early, first cooking a meal around 5pm and, seeing no one come around the path, decided to get the tent down. I used an OEX Phoxx I, which did the job in terms of shelter and size in the pack, but offered no way of sitting up and could be slightly confining. In the dying light from my secret spot, I had a full view of the path on the other side of the headland and saw no one come around, probably deterred by weather and the isolated area. Prayed for dry shoes the next day.

First Night's Camp.

9/10/2024 Day 2: Gurnard’s Head (roughly)- Trescean, Land’s End. Approx. 16 miles

Days 1 & 2 I mostly resembled a walking clothes horse.

Very windy overnight in my isolated little nook. The inlet near me had a cave, that I swear on three occasions I heard bats. The charge of the sea into that inlet was a steady thunder. The Westerly wind battled against my tent, which was half-exposed, but guttered out sometime in the early hours and threw an hour of rain at me instead. The night before I had unpacked clumsily, leaving my waterproof bag outside but not sealed so the contents were slightly damp. Both my pairs of socks were wet after I stupidly got out the tent in the night to check the pegs without taking my socks off and my shoes were still wet. I still felt good about the walk though, thinking more that these were all mistakes I could rectify in the day and not make again. I broke camp and followed a tip I’d heard somewhere to get an hour of walking in before making breakfast or coffee as you might find somewhere much nicer or even a bench than the area you camped in the night before.

Bosigran Castle ruins

Drier today. I had breakfast and made coffee in the ruins of Bosigran castle, taking shelter in those ancient footings and walls. Walking on the coastline near Levant and Pendeen there’s lots of ruins of mines, smelteries and industry. Monolithic tin smelteries, many still with their tall chimney stacks, keep watch from the fields just a little inland. The ‘Tin Coast’ as I’ve heard it called since. I have lunch taking shelter from the wind this time by the walls of an arsenic works. Older tourists make their way around the ruins; the men almost always have a flat cap on. Looming high above the levant mine is a huge modern gravelworks.

After the rugged and bracken covered coastline from St.Ives to the Levant mine, the mowed grass areas around Pendeen feel suddenly alien, like the isolated lawns and environments of a dream. Lots of birders, which I would see again along the Hayle estuary. Gentler path to Cape Cornwall. Filled up water at the café at Cape Cornwall, and was informed by an incredibly friendly national trust volunteer that Land’s End was just two hours away. Her friendly voice felt odd after a couple of days of barely talking to anyone.

Dealing with cramp in the arch of my right foot. I have very high arches, so this could be a problem; I stretched it out as much as I could and watched where on my foot I put my weight. (Over the coming days I found proper lacing technique would by-and-large save me this cramp.) On reaching the beach at Sennen Cove, I walked the length of it to the village barefoot, which felt blissful. I thought on having a swim, but it was too windy and the beach was full of jellyfish which put me off. A pint at the success inn, where I was served by someone dressed a little like a pirate, a character of which I seem to witness on each visit to Cornwall, as if the like of Shakespeare’s Pirates of Penzance has seeped into the cultural subconscious.

Almost all day I have had my swimming trunks, towel, raincoat and a pair of socks on the outside of my bag in an attempt to get it all to dry. In a carpark in Sennen Cove a guy tells me about a secret track he uses to get to Lands End (which I won’t need as I’m heading one-way) but also about a shipwreck slightly off the path, which I took up on.

Ship wreck near land's end.

I feel I didn’t witness Lands End itself, as in the rock formation or headland; coming up the path I was struck by the enormity of the hotel there, like a colonial outpost or compound. It was like the hotel was trying to claim the significance of that nipple of coast for themself. I veered away, inland to Trescean, to the Land’s End hostel where I was enticed with the thought of somewhere cosy for the night, somewhere I could dry off my shoes and gear. I end up being the only guest as they’re in the middle of a deep clean, and so I have a very quiet space to eat my dinner, sort my gear out, and have an incredible sleep.

Zzzz

10/10/2024 Day 3: Trescean, Land’s End- Penzance. Approx. 17 miles

Wake at 6:30AM from a dead deep sleep, feeling a little dehydrated. Raining first thing so I take my time to get ready. Last night, after carrying it and getting it smashed about in my bag, finally started reading James Joyce’s Dubliners.

Waited an hour for rain to abate and headed out 8ish in wet gear across fields around Trescean after deciding against doubling back to be completionist about the coast path around Land’s End.

Rain completely stopped by 8:30 and actually gifted some sun at 9- still amazed how fast my blissfully dry shoes got wet in the fields. Beautiful flower blossoms in the fields left fallow and gorgeous, huge skies with the autumn sunrise blasting the clouds into drama.

Instead of the South West Coast path, I walk some public footpaths from Trescean to Porthgwarra, but get mixed up and used the bridleway and country lanes for a short while. Made coffee on a bench near Porthcurno. Satisfied looking at my hobo cooking set up, the alcohol stove made from a beer can and the wind guard just tinfoil. When I get home I immediately bin my cooking pot, realizing the Teflon coat was degrading and I’d probably ingested some.

Not long after I meet Rowan and Chris, walking Penzance- St.Ives and wild camping. Was very joyful to meet people with the same ambitions and I wish I’d met them on day one to bolster me for the journey ahead.

Despite being October the heat sometimes puts me in just a t-shirt. Sheltered by mainland Cornwall from the Westerly wind now. Was feeling dehydrated and peaky all morning after my deep, deep sleep but after 2 coffees, ibuprofen and a rehydration tablet in my water bottle I feel loads better.

A proper blunder- I overtake an older French couple and come out on St. Loy’s Cove, a beautiful beach of huge rounded boulders. The signpost just pointed over it, so I began scrambling over each massive rock thinking to myself how odd it was that the path went this way, wondering how the old French couple were going to manage. I even stood in a rock pool. Like a true idiot I just carried on, never thinking that this couldn’t possibly be the right way, climbing awkwardly over a point into Paynter’s Cove. It was here I had the calm thought of ‘oh, the tide’s coming in.’ The tide was coming in fast to this small cove with no exit on the cliff on the other side. I could have, and should have, safely doubled back into St. Loy’s Cove and found the actual path entrance, but, as adrenaline began setting in a bit and also concerned about making it to the campsite I’d booked in Penzance, I made out the path of least resistance- up.

Entering St. Loy's Cove

With my pack weighing my back down, I miraculously, and quite quickly, made it up the cliff, into some scrubby undergrowth of nettles and blackthorn, and, hearing a pair of French voices, determined my way back on the path. I plunge up and out of the undergrowth, to the surprise of the French couple I’d overtaken earlier on. I remember the lady had a very unimpressed facial expression, whereas the man was a little jovial, as I gave them a panicked smile and laugh as my heart thundered with adrenaline, I felt hot and sticky and my legs now tingled with the touch of many stinging nettles.

The tide coming in, and halfway through my climb.

I walked a little further before stopping to recuperate with a quick lunch at Boscawen Point. Though rocky at times, the path is noticeably gentler in gradient. Begin seeing more people around Lamorna, maybe on holiday in the busy stretch of coast Mousehole- Marazion. Lamorna cove is itself very beautiful. Not long after, the path enters the Kemyel Crease nature reserve, which I found quite memorable though it was small. Sheltered from the sea air by non-notive Monterey pines planted to provide protection for cultivation in the fields behind, the stretch of plantation later became a novel ecosystem as trees were brought down by forest and non-native shrubbery (rhododendron, privet, hydrangea etc.,) seeded themselves in the freed up spaces.

A little oddity near Lamorna- a celtic cross with a pile of coins rusting at the base.

Pint at the Ship Inn, Mousehole, then walk to Penzance. Even though I was still along the coast this stretch felt positively urbane. The campsite I booked is on the outskirts of Penzane in Heamoor, so I have to walk up through the less glamorous side of town to get there, which makes a welcome change after much gentle tourist-friendly places that make you wonder where all the locals live their lives. Walking past the chip shop in Heamoor a young lad says to me “alright dick” which makes me double take. Still unsure if meant as an insult.

I think I’m the only one in a tent at the campsite, Stream Valley Holiday Park. I am surrounded by caravans and campervans. Unable to sit up in the tent, I cook and eat outside in the drizzle, before getting into my sleeping bag to read for a while before trying to sleep.

Final night's camp

11/10/2024 Day 4 Penzance- Hayle. Approx. 18 miles (St. Michael’s Way 12 miles, South West Coast Path 6 miles.)

Here I go

Cold night’s sleep in the tent, and end up wearing all of my clothes, draping my waterproof on top of the sleeping bag and wrapping my puffy coat around my waist- a little googling tells me that you should let your torso exude heat into the sleeping bag rather than keep it contained. Despite some tossing and turning, which feels loud because of my inflatable sleeping mat, I manage a good few hours. I have some breakfast and coffee in the early hours while everyone sleeps a while longer in their campers, still wearing all my clothes, and find that keeping baselayers on while breaking camp is a good way of warming up.

St. Piran, seen here painfully transmuted into a locomotive

I’ve found I have worn the skin on my hands more than my feet from regularly wringing out wet things; towel, socks, trunks, etc. Although by this last day I’ve accumulated a couple of blister plasters. Every morning and night, and on a few stops along the way I have applied Vaseline to my feet, my hands and my lips, and I think this slick first layer has helped a great deal.

St. Michael's Mount in the early morning.

On this, the final day, I have the best weather of the entire trip. I have my second dip in the sea, this time in Marazion near St. Michael’s Mount. It felt great. I generally felt much more spirited, I think in part because the day was fairly more defined; I’d follow the St. Michael’s way and get back to Hayle. It didn’t feel the intimidating and unknown journey I embarked upon on days one and two. I bought a pasty in Marazion that I wolfed down as I started the way.

I’ve recently become more interested In pilgrim paths, and can now say I’ve ‘completed’ one (or near enough- more on that later). I can’t remember where I heard it, but I vaguely recall learning that pilgrims from Ireland would take a version of this route when they landed by ferry on the Atlantic coast, to access another ferry to mainland Europe to continue to Rome or Jerusalem.

The St. Michael's Way Pilgrim's Path marker.

I wander around Ludgvan churchyard for a moment, taking in all the Cornish surnames on the old gravestones; Rowe, Trebarrow, Curnow. Really I had got a little turned around in the Church grounds, thinking I was looking for a public footpath entrance, but found from my map I had to cut back onto the road and away, out of Ludgvan and back into the fields.

Definitely less hills; still some hills, but nothing like the intense cresting flint paths that tumbled over each headland after St. Ives. Despite a lingering damp and the odd leaf starting to turn, it felt like late summer again, with a warm sun and large butterflies everywhere, which gave me some hope after a low bug count this summer nationwide.

I come over the hill up past Trembethow dairy and feel that old Westerly wind hit me, and can actually see the coastline I started out from. The land between Ludgvan and Carbis Bay is dairy country; twice I touched an electric fence, walked many paths of sucking mud and had to walk through a smashed up farmyard under the suspicious gaze of two smoking workers.

Seeing the sea at Carbis Bay on the final day.

The fields and valleys become taken over by buildings that I can’t decide are for locals or tourists, and I come to the settlement of Carbis Bay. Here, I lose the pilgrim path which would’ve taken me to the Knill’s monument near St. Ives, through Steeple Woods and then to Carbis Bay near Porthminster Point. Instead, I think I got taken up by a public footpath, into the Carbis Bay settlement, down a couple of roads then another footpath coming out in the Carbis Bay beach hotel area. Another needed barefoot walk across the sands, and then a walk up some steep steps that apparently also double as a cliffside spring, to rejoin the South West Coast Path to Hayle.

This Is gentle walking now, especially in comparison to all traversed before. Sandy pathways, lots of flats, and, if any gradient, downhill. I laugh a little looking at the wide vista of Porthkidny sands in the sunshine; four days early I’d looked back at this view under grey rainclouds.

Although easy going on the feet and legs, the stretch from Lelant Church into Hayle feels very long as you have to make your way all around the Hayle estuary. Lots of birders present along the walls for wading birds. Also tonnes of pampas grass, growing in spurts along fencelines and in the estuary, and in places entire acres of it. I’d heard it was invasive before, and I suppose Cornwall’s milder climate lends to its spread.

I feel a little giddy re-walking this familiar path back the other way, and, while walking along the cycle path along the Causeway spy the Hayle town sign, and feel emotional; I’d made it, I’d completed the loop.

Waiting in town for three hours for my train home, I cook my last batch of noodles on a bench, have a pint and a coffee, and use the asda toilets, remembering that I’d actually been to Hayle before, once, to use this giant asda.

When the train stops at Camborne, someone plays Jethro’s ‘We don’t stop Camborne Wednesdays’ bit for their friend loudly on their phone. So long, Cornwall.

Gear:

· Patagonia stormfront bag: I’ve used and abused this bag for years. It’s not ultra light, but its durable and very waterproof. Lots of ways to utilize outside storage as well. I only wish I’d found a water bottle caddy to attach to the side.

· lightweight sleeping bag: wish I’d brought a liner as this is a Spring/ Summer bag

· lightweight OEX Phoxx I tent: first use of this, did the job albeit a bit pokey.

· Big Agnes inflatable sleeping mat: have used multiple times and always does well.

· Beer can stove + bio-ethanol fuel: old trusty, a stove I made while a student. Takes learning the ‘knack’ but decent for bringing water to boil and simple cooking.

· Sawyer Squeeze water filter: used at least once a day. Unsure if this was wise, as the springs I encountered all came through agricultural land and it had rained heavily, so I probably ingested run-off which the filter can’t cope with. I did have an upset stomache for a few days when I was back, and this could’ve been the cause.

· a 750ml plastic waterbottle and a 500ml plastic waterbottle: nothing fancy, just empty drinks bottles.

· Lifeventure microfibre towel

· Microfibre dishcloth for wiping tent condensation down

Clothing:

· thermal underlayer; one big stitched rip in the knee.

· Canterbury rugby shorts

· Very moth eaten & stitched up black cashmere jumper

· Cotton baseball cap

· Beanie for sleeping

· Two pairs of walking socks

· Two pairs of pants

· Two T-shirts