me v the trail – 9 Aug, 2018
Day 7 Land’s End to John O’Groats – Polzeath to Tintagel
Distance: 25km
Cumulative distance: 173km
I’d been seeing these birds as I worked my way up the Cornish coastline that I’d never come across before in Australia. They’re these brown things with incredibly beautiful tipped wings, and they have this ability to almost float in the sky dead still for a few seconds before swooping down on potential prey. They pick their spot, flap wildly for a few seconds to calibrate and then just hover in the wind waiting for their next opportunity. If they lose their balance, they flap wildly again and re-position. Then after a few seconds they let the wind and gravity shift them to another spot and repeat the process. When they see something they like, they swoop down below the cliffs. I had been hoping these might have been peregrine falcons (the fastest birds in the world as we all know) but it turns out they’re kestrels, according to an avian aficionado I passed on the trail during the morning. Maybe he was just a binocular enthusiast, but in any event he seemed to know more about winged beings than I did. Nature is really quite remarkable.
I packed up this morning and walked all the way back down the hill and through the rest of Polzeath before turning right and heading out of town. It was a sluggish start after yesterday’s tiring efforts, but I willed myself to Pentire Point which provided one of the best lookouts so far, particular down to the southern reaches of the coastline. The view is so good I ran into a film crew waiting for the sun to clear so they could record the latest episode of Country File Diaries. Geez you must spend a lot of time waiting around as a film crew in this country if that’s your attitude! Sadly, a request to interview an Australian walker was sadly not forthcoming. I pushed on and came to an unexpected highlight – a plaque on the cliff front where the superb poem “For The Fallen” was composed, between Pentire Point and The Rumps in 1914. Laurence Binyon was the man responsible for this historic piece of work which you all know as the Ode of Remembrance recited annually on ANZAC Day and Remembrance Day. Walking past the plaque was a particularly powerful experience.
Soon after I came to the Rumps, twin headlands once again showing off Cornwall’s incredible coastline, and hooked back around to push on further east. Prior to all this I’d seen a sign saying seven miles to Port Isaac and I’d resolved to have a Cornish cream tea there for lunch. That was roughly the halfway point of the day’s walking and I’d read it was a very nice town too. I came into Port Quin, and as an illustration as to just how much I was battling I opted, for the first time, to forego the Coast Path in favour of minor roads. (Previous road walking had come when the Coast Path was not available). The reason I did this was the sign said three miles to Port Isaac via the coast, and only two miles via the road. Anyway, I strode on for a mile and a bit then blindly marched straight past the turnoff I needed to take. I kept on feeling I was getting no closer to my goal and eventually came to a T intersection with a sign pointing to the left telling me Port Isaac was a further three miles down the road! I was filthy, so turned around and went back to the turnoff I’d missed which boasted a sign saying this was the way for lighter-weight vehicles. I eventually found the town, and descended incredibly steeply to the bottom. In the end I’d have walked less if I’d taken the coast path. Classic. And just on the steepness of the town, it’s the sharpest gradient I think I’ve walked on in terms of a road. Steeper even than Clovelly in north Devon, which I’d been to once before and which I would be passing through a week or so later. But the town itself was ancient and exquisite and perfect, nestled down by the water with a heap of old white and stone buildings.
This was where Doc Martin was filmed so you’ll know what I’m talking about if you’ve seen that show. I stopped in a pub/café type place which had been around since 1527 and had my cream tea. I looked around the town a little, exploring a few of the ‘trangs’ which are narrow alleyways, some of which measure about 18 inches across, and one of which my cumbersome backpack and I couldn’t even fit through. One more observation on Port Isaac and a number of these little towns throughout the southwest – cars and pedestrians seem to happily coexist on the roads as one, given the lack of footpaths. And I reckon it’s grand.
Eight miles stood between me and Tintagel, and the Port Isaac experience topped off with that cream tea had me in much better spirits and seemed to give me a physical boost. I had a small drama coming through Port Gaverne, not even a mile out of Port Isaac. The path appeared to go right down to the water, and then up again via some sharp steps onto the next headland. But the tide was right in and the bottom of that path was covered by about a 3-4 metre stretch of water. I walked up the road instead but after a few short minutes decided that wasn’t the answer. Then I went back down to the path, and scaled some steep rocks to put me about 10m above the beach. Then I had to scramble across a sheer rock face (which I probably shouldn’t have done let’s face it, especially with a backpack) and then I was hoping to drop in to the path from above but again, I couldn’t get close enough to it without allowing gravity to dictate my immediate future. So I scrambled up a grassy bank all the way to the road and pressed on that way. About 10 metres further along from where I’d turned around before a footpath pointed off to the left, so I took that. The footpath took me right around the headland, hugging its rugged edge, then spun me back around and spat me out only 50 or 100m further up the road! Ahh hindsight is a wonderful thing.
A little bit further down the way I had another issue – I thought I’d lost my glasses. A bit of rain started to drizzle so I rearranged my sleeping bag so it wouldn’t get wet. And then realised I didn’t have my glasses as I was about to walk off (I was wearing my sunnies at that point). Just on the glasses – for the first week or so, just where to put my glasses had posed a tricky problem. I have two pairs obviously, my specs and my sunnies, and usually when I wear one the other is tucked away at the base of my neck into my T shirt of jumper or whatever I’m wearing up top. I didn’t like this set up from the start while walking, given the challenging terrain and that fact that if I fell forward, the glasses dangling out in front might end up trying to poke me in the throat. So I started clipping them instead to my chest strap (hold that thought, I’ll describe the configuration of my backpack in a later post). Which meant they were on a similar latitude, but just over to one side so if I did fall forward, my neck would be out of harm’s way. But this brought its own problems – they weren’t as secure out there, and every time I took off my pack there was a chance they’d go flying off in a random direction if I hadn’t tended to them first. Which was the situation I found myself in right now. I poked around a little in the deep grass either side of the path, then shifted my pack, then poked around a bit more, then lifted my pack up once more and there they were. Bullet dodged. Who’d have thought glasses could cause such a drama. Anyway, I suppose that’s just another one of those little things you need to consider when you’re hiking.
So, eight miles (a bit less by now) to Tintagel, and as I was about to find out this was possibly the toughest stretch I’d encountered yet. There were a shite load of headlands and river crossings between me and the campsite I’d picked out, and each one meant descending almost all the way to sea level, and then immediately climbing all that way back up. One such section was so steep downhill it looked like it just disappeared over the edge. I also remember slogging it uphill parallel to a fence line that stretched on forever. But I was particularly determined at this stage with a new found aggressive mindset. I figured the trail was an obstacle course trying to stop me from making Tintagel and I was determined to overcome it. I felt like Principal Skinner chasing Bart Simpson when the latter had decided to wag school. There were four of these murderous down-ups, then some flat, high clifftop walking for a little while (at which point I relaxed and thought I’d beaten the trail), then came two more river crossings and then a sharp descent into Trebarwith Strand. Finally another sign and it told me two and a quarter miles to Tintagel. I powered up out of the town (very steep once more) then enjoyed a bit more flat ground. I finally turned off at the road to Tintagel (before the castle, I’d planned on checking that out tomorrow) and it started to rain. There’d been a big grey cloud out at sea for the entire afternoon and it finally decided to come over and unleash. This initial rain wasn’t too bad, and after walking through town I made it to the campsite. The owner was particularly thorough with his instructions for finding a spot to pitch my tent… “ Pitch in this triangular patch of grass to the left of the road, don’t pitch near an electrical hook up, don’t get too close to caravans, don’t get too close to other tents, don’t pitch up in an area where the grass blade per square inch ratio exceeds the annual rainfall of Tintagel, don’t pitch in any place where you can see the castle” (you get the idea). Then I turned around to go and select a camping spot and discovered the heavens had finally opened for good. It was hosing down so I politely told the gentleman I planned to wait inside until it had receded a little. After five minutes it had eased to more of a shower so I decided to go for it (rather than risk being saddled with more camping rules) and I made a dash for it. The rain and wind steadily increased as I was trying to set up, and after five minutes a fella wandered down from his camper van to give me a hand. This was Antony from Nottingham, a ripping bloke who helped me erect my tent, and five minutes later his wife Amanda arrived with a cup of tea. Such lovely people. And the interior of my tent had remained mostly dry through all that, as had most of my sleeping mat and my sleeping bag.
