April 5, 1993: Mullion Cove to Cadgwith
Mullion Island
The wind was still howling when we got up for the third day of our walk, but there was some sun about and the surfaces outside were dry. “You can tell it’s windy,” I told the others at breakfast, “when the swimming pool has a surf.” We had a leisurely breakfast while the Lees thumbed through newspapers that had been elegantly draped over the backs of their chairs. At 9:55 we were off.
The Countryside Commission guidebook suggested that there was a path directly down to the harbor of Porth Mellin but I noticed this only several days later. The Hall and Mason guide, the source of all those burdensome black arrows, has the walker descend by road to the bottom of the valley and return, also by road, through the village to the sea front. This was in fact quite a delightful springtime walk – providing us with some rare sheltered walking on a day that would be increasingly dominated by wind. The flimsy swimsuits for sale in the windows of a local shop seemed particularly out of place on such a raw day.
We tackled our first black arrow, climbing up steeply from Porth Mellin, and heading south – the dominant direction again – as we formally entered the precincts of the fascinating Lizard Peninsula. I was reminded very much of the terrain covered on our Land’s End day the previous year – headlands, often spongy, cut by streams and deep combes, with cliffs and islands and a crashing surf always on our right. We made very slow progress, especially because the wind was blowing us about a good bit. Fortunately it was blowing in from the sea – so there didn’t seem to be much danger of getting pushed over the cliff edge – but it was still disconcerting.
Moreover there was moisture in the wind too. Squalls kept developing behind us and Harold would offer predictions on whether or not we would get caught. Finally we were enveloped and so we had to pause and put on our gear. I took off my pack and slipped into my rain pants and rain cape. The latter drifted away as I bent over to refasten the pack but Tosh caught it. I had decided that I would have to put the pack on after donning the cape; a cape on the outside would have made me airborne today. Similarly I wore my sweater hood over my cap. Tosh’s Toronto cap blew away a few minutes later but after we had retrieved it we made her put her woolen cap over it and it stayed in place. The rain lashed at us for only a few minutes, recurring once or twice in the next few hours. I kept my cape on anyway, but more for warmth than because of moisture.
We tried to make progress against the wind as we battled over Predannack head and Vellan head. Margie and I linked arms, making it harder for the wind to loft either one of us. We were ahead of the others and once I turned back to see how the Lees were doing. They had disappeared! We were puzzling this out when I discovered them at last; they had decided to lie down flat on the ground until the squall had passed. Meanwhile a rescue helicopter from the adjacent station hovered above them. It had probably not started out with the Lees as its primary mission – a walker was missing from the previous day – but it stayed close until they seemed to be in control of their own bodies again. Eventually they rose and followed Margie and me down into the valley of Soap Rock.
Here we had a rest and a snack. It was past noon and we had only covered a little over two miles. Harold and I went upstream for a pee and then we climbed steeply up to Rill Point and down into Kynance Cove. The sun had returned and we had seen the last of the rain but it was still very windy. On the steep descent into this popular holiday spot I reminded Tosh that my guidebook promised refreshments here but when we reached the bottom the teahouse was still undergoing its winter repairs. There are two routes out of the cove and I’m sure I took the more difficult one, across the sand and over some rocks to some steps and then up to a tarmac road. There didn’t seem to be any point in dawdling about and so I wanted to press on – but after climbing up to a parking lot on the cliff top I discovered some loos and an open kiosk.
The Lees headed for the loos while I got in line at the kiosk. Unfortunately I was followed by a large party of trippers and this meant that the Lees would have quite a while to wait before giving their orders to the slowest chef in the west. You wouldn’t expect that there would be so much attention to detail in a caravan cookery but the bearded hippie who manned the fort explained that the National Trust imposes standards even on food vendors. I asked for a tuna sandwich and he lovingly set about the construction of this object, interrupted twice by the collapse of his menu board in the wind. “Would you like salad cream or mayonnaise?” he asked at one point. “Yeh,” I shouted above the roar. “Which?” he continued, “salad cream or mayonnaise?” Five minutes later I sat down in a heap of grass and tried to drink my Diet Coke and eat my sandwich before the wind ripped all of the filling out.
Margie hid behind a wall to eat her sandwich and the Lees, who had ordered coffee, arrived at last as well. When I went to throw my napkin away in a dustbin next to the loos the wind lofted it before I could get the lid back down. It was against this wind that we tried to make continued progress after half an hour. It was nearing 2:00.
The lighthouse from Lizard Point
Off to our left we could see the buildings of Lizard town on the horizon but we had no occasion to visit this place, keeping very strictly to the coast path and cutting no corners – afraid perhaps that we would miss some exhilarating prospect. There were many of these as we rounded Lizard Point, heading east again, and getting our first good views of the famous lighthouse. There was a steep descent down to Polpeor Cove. As I was waiting for the others to follow me I slipped, from a standing posture, and fell into the mud next to a footbridge. Fortunately I was still wearing all my rain gear.
We climbed up to the line of shops and cafes at England’s most southerly point. One of the latter was closed but a second, advertising itself as “the most southerly cafe,” was open, and we headed here after a brief visit to a serpentine rock shop, where Tosh picked up a rock and I bought a serpentine egg to go with all the rock eggs we brought back from Rhodes.
In the cafe I ordered some ice cream and a “milk shake.” “Next time I order a milk shake in this country,” I told the others, “remind me not to do it.” I had forgotten, once again, that the British version of a milk shake, at least in 1993, was a glass of milk with some powdered flavoring spooned in. Mine was supposed to be pineapple, but I couldn’t find any resemblance. Tosh had better luck with a piece of black current and apple pie and it was, at any rate, warm behind the glass window of the cafe. I took off my rain cape.
We had arrived at 3:00 and after half an hour or so it was time to move on. The direction of march soon shifted from east to north as we headed up the east side of the peninsula. The wind was dropping too and we had a very pleasant stroll, though there was a steep drop on steps into Housel Bay and an equally stiff climb back up. In a field at the top two boys were trying to use themselves as kites – running at the cliff edge and being pushed back by the updraft. “You guys better hope that the wind doesn’t suddenly shift direction,” I said as we passed.
The Devil’s Frying Pan
We passed a Marconi signal station and a coastguard facility and, at Kilcobben Cove, the new lifeboat station. Then we passed below the thatched buildings of the hamlet of Landewednack and up through an old quarry. The late afternoon sunlight provided a wonderful atmosphere for our last mile along narrow paths in the gorse and hawthorn. There was one dramatic surprise. Just before reaching Cadgwith we passed around the top of The Devil’s Frying Pan, a cove separated from the sea by a narrow arched opening. It was high tide and the water would roll through the arch and crash up the sides of the cove in great volume. A railing along the path provided many good vantage points, some occupied by Japanese tourists, as we edged our way around and into the gardens of Cadgwith itself.
This very attractive seafaring village with its boats lining the harbor road beckoned below us as we descended to the ancient Cadgwith Cove Hotel at 5:30. We had completed nine and a half miles on a very eventful day. Our landlord answered our knock and took us upstairs to our rooms. These were on the seedy side, with poor light illuminating reddish carpets and drapes and rickety furniture. Harold complained that the orange lamp shades in his room provided illumination for the kind of room you would certainly not share with your wife. We took turns in the bathroom, using a tub scarred by many a tired traveler in the past. At 7:00 we met downstairs but the Lees really wanted to find someplace else to eat. The next door restaurant had closed for the evening, however, and so he had to make do with the pub grub.
I phoned Dorothy, who had been out with the dog the night before, from a phone at the end of one of the bars. It was rather cozy near the fire in the room we were sitting in (Harold asked to change seats with me so he could have a cushion) and after a few drinks it didn’t seem too bad of a place to be. We met another walking couple, John and Helen Cottington, and shared anecdotes of the trail while I had cod, chips and mushy peas. Once again we had an early night and once again there was a howling wind outside my window – but this time I had to get up and take a sleeping pill in the middle of the night after some fitful tossing and turning on another wild night.
To continue with the next stage of our walk you need: