August 4, 1991: Padstow to Treyarnon Bay

Yes, I was suffering from a malady on August 3, 1991 – as Dorothy, Toby, and I waited for the taxi that would take us to Paddington Station at the outset of our fifth Southwest Peninsula Coast Path walk. But my slightly sore back surely had to take second place to Tosh’s. “Prepare yourself for a shock,” she had told me only the day before, “I just rolled over funny in bed and I’m immobilized.” I had sent her some train tickets in the hope that she might get well enough to join us later in the week but, sadly, it was only two other companions we now searched for in the crowded hallway of the train station, Harold, and the Lees’ friend from Boston, Marjorie Rogers.

Marge had walked one day on the London Countryway some years earlier, so I had some confidence in her abilities as a walker – even though she soon announced that she was having knee problems. Nevertheless she had flown in just two days earlier in order to undertake this expedition and so there seems to have been no thought given to anyone else from Acton packing it in now. Harold re-introduced us to Marge as we waited for a track number to appear on the board. I slipped some change to a panhandler who was patrolling the station with her baby in a pushchair.

We left at 11:10. I had reserved seats for us in first class, where – for only a small weekend supplement – we had more room. Indeed Toby was so well hidden under the table when the guard came by that there was some confusion over the number of tickets I had just handed him. There were only a few stops as the train headed west. Marge, a retired school counselor, was trying to read a book on the Golden Spike and Harold was reading The Independent. We chatted in an amiable manner, particularly as the train reached the West Country and started to slow down. It was obvious that we just had to put thoughts of poor Tosh behind us and get on with our holiday. We arrived at Newquay around 3:45.

I had tried to book rooms along the coast in our usual one at a time manner but even though I had been working weeks ahead it seemed that it was impossible to get three rooms for only one night in the middle of the high season for all the other holidaymakers. So Dorothy and I had decided to put our group into one centrally located hotel and use our cars, as we had done in Lakeland in 1990, to move back and forth to needed sites. But Harold and Tosh, it turned out, had just driven seven thousand miles in the States and Canada and didn’t want the driving burden. I had appointed Tosh to see if she could find a firm that would drop us off and pick us up each day and she had discovered, through the tourist information bureau, Colin. Even though we had to wait until 4:30 to be picked up at the station I wanted to make contact with our driver today – so that we could make arrangements for the next day as well.

Trina, his assistant, actually came by with her boyfriend to tell us that Colin would soon arrive in his seven-seater space cruiser. Soon we were loading everything into the back of the van and beginning an oft-repeated journey of about fifteen minutes through the traffic and up the coast road to Watergate Bay. You could see our hotel from the top of the road, sitting dumpily next to the more glamorous Watergate Bay Hotel on the left. Harold announced to our host that Tosh would not be coming immediately but that he wished to keep the double room anyway in case she turned up. This uncertainty sounded a bit of a sour note that strained our relations with hotel management from the outset (Tosh later tried to get her money back).

We had some time to wander down to the lovely beach below the Watergate Bay Hotel, the northern end of a truly fine stretch of sand. Toby had a wonderful time running around and then exploring some of the rocky caves at the rear of the beach but it wasn’t until we left sand and returned to the grass of the coast path itself that he released his afternoon gift upon the earth.

He had to endure his first separation from his “parents” at 6:45 when we went downstairs to have a drink. By this time all of the other diners had fallen on their chow as though they hadn’t enjoyed a meal in months. When we did find our table it seemed to be in no man’s land as far – as service was concerned – and after about fifteen minutes I had to flag down a waitress. She sent her friend over, a throaty blonde with a beehive and a bad temper. Blondie had been stomping back to the kitchen, making faces and muttering to herself whenever anyone asked for the slightest variation in the menu.

We came quietly and made our selection of fruit juice or soup (you got a thimbleful of either) and some entree – I had scampi – probably too rich a diet for the warm afternoon this was turning out to be. I ordered a bottle of wine from our host (who couldn’t get the cork out properly), but we had to pay for this on the spot – a seedy practice, if you ask me. The food was unexceptional – not nearly as interesting as that served at the Bridge Hotel in Buttermere the previous year, but I don’t think anyone ever went away hungry.

We took our coffee outdoors (there was too much cigarette smoke indoors) and then went for a walk up along the coast path to the north. There was a lovely sunset over the waves below and we walked almost a mile before turning back. We had a TV in our room and we watched the news, but we were pretty tired and soon went to bed. I was wearing the plastic insert the dentist had given me to prevent damage to an injured tooth – and Dorothy kept fretting that I would swallow it.

The next morning, Sunday, August 4th, we met the others for breakfast at 8:30. I had Alpen and the full breakfast but the others were all much more health-minded than yours truly, especially Margie – who had even brought more bran to put on her cereal. It was a lovely sunny morning when Colin pulled up shortly before 9:30 and ferried us up to Padstow. We got there much faster than I had anticipated and we were already strolling around the inner harbor at 10:00. I had always wanted Dorothy to see Padstow, which has much charm. She was busy buying sunglass clip-ons (I bought a set too) while others purchased snacks and I got my maps ready. A little girl told me she had a dog like Toby at home.

At about 10:20 we were able to begin our walk. Harold lead us by the Ship Hotel, where we had finished up a year ago April, and we headed north out of town, releasing the dog to scamper delightedly over the grass as we pursued a tarmaced path to a war monument. There were many other people about, most of them using nearby beaches. We paused once, before rounding St. George’s Cove, to spread lotion on our sun-free skin. As we moved along the southern side of Harbour Cove, using stiles to make progress, I noted that this beach prohibited dogs (Watergate Bay had merely expressed a preference for children over dogs). This was somewhat disconcerting because we soon needed to introduce our dog to the waves.

As we penetrated the almost tropical foliage at the head of the cove we spotted some fresh water running beneath a bridge of duckboards. Toby was encouraged to have a drink but when he approached the spot his little legs sank into the hidden slime beneath a sandy surface and he emerged from his drink covered in mud. He shook himself and covered my tan pants in brown dots. We continued past an Irish Setter and around to the north again, reaching the hamlet of Hawker’s Cove, a collection of cottages, one set for pilots, and the other for the lifeboatmen who had to rescue stranded pilots. A little alleyway lead down to a bit of sea here and Dorothy washed the Tobester’s legs while the rest of us waited in a parking lot above.

We approached Stepper Point and circled our first large headland, a day mark tower and a coast guard station on our left. The latter had posted a dogs off lead will be shot sign, but this seemed to refer only to the station access road. I found this warning to be a bit hysterical anyway. “Dogs on lead, please” would have been just as useful.

To our right were now getting extensive views down a coastline that we would be walking the next few days and it was certainly an inviting stretch of territory. Straight ahead were views back down the Camel estuary, with many sailboats making a very colorful scene. Wildflowers, including heather, bloomed on all the hills and the sea, which we could see crashing below us as we neared the edge of the cliff at Butter Hole and Longcarrow Cove, was beautiful in its many rich shades – from emerald green to the deepest sapphire.

It was the most delicious and easy way to start a walk except for one thing: Dorothy was having stomach problems. We tried to find a place for her to be sick but it was impossible to climb the fences hereabouts and there were people everywhere. I promised her that there would be toilets in Trevone, our lunch spot, so she gamely held on as we passed the chasm of Round Hole, a collapsed cave, and headed down toward the broiling multitude packed onto the Trevone sands. Already I could spot facilities next to a large cafe and so we headed here. Dorothy no longer seemed in dire distress, even stopping to help a mother carry a pushchair up the steps, but she soon disappeared into the ladies and was lost to sight.

When she emerged she wanted only a soft drink. The rest of us tried the local version of cheeseburger and chips – quite a revelation for Margie. Toby was given several chips but he kept putting them in the sand before eating them. Quite a few pictures were taken. Dorothy was working on a roll of black and white film and had a throwaway stretch camera as well. I had slides as usual and Margie had some throwaway cameras too. The idea of throwing the camera away because you have used up its film is surely an invention mankind could have lived without.

Dorothy seemed to be her old self by the time Harold and Marge had finished their coffee. Since we had all eaten the same food it was hard for us to account for the nausea – until we concluded that it was her new trifocals that were causing the difficulty.

A small crisis followed. I had noted that Trevone beach banned dogs and also that the coast path uses about a hundred yards of the beach to make progress around the head of the bay. Consequently I decided to ignore the prohibition. I believe I heard one “Excuse me” from some blubber-bellied codgers sitting at the beach entrance, but I ignored this and I marched toward the steps that lead us off the beach. If Trevone Council and the Countryside Commission had wanted to work out an alternate and signposted route for dogs I should have been glad to follow it. How did Boogie accomplish his 500-mile walkies when he did the path with Mark Wallington?

We continued west toward Harlyn Bay, another oasis of sand choked on this Sunday with holidaymakers. The skies became a bit cloudier as we reached Mother Ivy’s Bay. We left the cliff edge, after views of the lifeboat station, to head inland a bit. Dorothy was taking black and white pictures of several interesting houses and, after a climb along hedgerows, of Trevose Head’s lighthouse. Our route then took us behind Booby’s Bay, Constantine Bay, and Treyarnon Beach; part of the time we disdained the up and down of the sand dunes and used the beachfront instead.

I had asked Colin to pick us up at 5:00 but we had arrived closer to 4:30. There was an ice cream truck parked just opposite the entrance to the youth hostel, our pick-up point, and Margie had her first mint chocolate crisp of the outing. Actually, Colin was a few minutes early so we were soon speeding back to Watergate Bay. There was time for showers and a drink in the bar before answering the 6:45 dinner bell.

There were small children everywhere, babbling, cooing, and squawking. Another waitress served us our two kinds of potatoes, peas and carrots. We switched white wines and our host again had difficulty with his corkscrew. We took coffee in the bar and I walked with the dog on the hillside to the south of the hotel, using the coast path almost every night to round off the dog’s nightly routine.

To continue with the next stage of our walk you need:

Day 18: Treyarnon Bay to Watergate Bay