I left Perranporth as soon as I could. The book that I am reading provides a guide to the route. The advice was that the hills are “steep and sharp”. This apparently means a shit load of steep up and down. The first big town I passed through was Newquay.
Bedruthen Steps
Not too far north I saw a National Trust sign to something. I accosted I driver at the road related to the said sign and asked if it, was worthwhile seeing. He said it was. It turned out to be the Bedruthen Steps. I stopped that the entrance to the carpark to ask the attendant about the place. He told me that the cliffs were the main feature, however, an interest fact was that site was an iron ore mine. The ore was taken from the cliff via the natural caves.
I left my bike with the attendant and headed off to the cliffs. At the top of the cliff I as engaged in conversation by another tourist from Dorking. He picked me as being someone from the either NZ or South Africa. His ignorance end did not end there. I told him what I had been told by the carpark attendant about the site being an iron ore mine. Oh no, was the response was “the only mines in Cornwall were tin”. People from Surrey know everything.
It appears that the carpark attendant is correct. Funny thing that; he works there and is not just a car park attendant. The bloke from Dorking should get a job as a carpark attendant.
Bananas Don’t Grow in Cornwall
My next stop was a café in a farm. Tea and scones were great. On sale was; “produce grown on the farm”. I ordered a banana which is apparently good for preventing cramp. I asked the café owner “where is your banana plant”? She thought I was serious.
Dogs, a Motorbike and Crepes
The route then took me the Padstow. This is classic fishing village. There many places in the ‘new world’ (e.g. Australia, NZ etc) that are named after town in Britain. I suspect there are few that could be as different as the Cornish and Sydney Padstows are.
On my walk around saw about 15 black Labrador dogs. It seem like a dog convention. I saw Laverda 1000 that was not a Jota. The owner spoke at length about the virtues of the bike. I should have given him the contact details of my Canberra host.
I bought lemon crepe at a mobile stall in the carpark. The two very attractive Cornish girls working in the stall decided to start speaking French. Not am not sure what was behind that strategy.
Another Great Railtrail
The route out of Padstow took me along the Camel Walk, a rail trail on ne of the meant lines closed following the Beeching Report in the 1960’s. As will all trail trails, it has been a great success.
The last part of the route into Launceston, the ancient capital of Cornwall was on the A30. This was not my preferred route, but there really wasn’t an option. Given it was late I decide to check into the White Hart Pub. A reasonable chicken meal was washed down by a nice glass of sav blanc and a pint of Skinners.
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