Good Times

It's a chilly Thursday morning, made worse by not quite dried hair. Even though it's tied in a loose knot, it still manages to send rippling waves of cold through my scalp, butterflying down my spine. So, I'm wearing a blue cardigan overlaid by a sleeveless jacket to offset the shivers. Our boiler, over aged, very tired, is on the blink. As too is my very ineffective hairdryer that's intent on blowing tepid air through my long, damp strands.

As I contemplate the sudden drop in temperature, inside and outside, and I wonder what Autumn has up her blustery sleeve, I realise I haven't told you about our recent Summer escape to the beautiful Lizard Peninsula, in South West Cornwall. I've hinted at it. But up until now, I haven't forged a blow by blow account. Don't worry, I shan't bore you with the tiniest grains of detail, just the highlights accentuated with a few pictures!

St Ives Harbour

Every year, thankfully, we manage to grab a week's break away from the walls of our two bed roomed flat. And every year, regretfully, we kick ourselves (that's Younger Dad and I) for not having taken two weeks instead - this year, probably more than any other. Have you ever been to Cornwall? Have you ever seen the abiding charm of the Lizard Peninsula? For me, other than the Lake District, it isn't like any other place in this country. Quiet, secluded, untouched. Beautiful, dramatic, undulating. The craggy coastline is dressed with golden sands, sculptured by hidden coves, decorated with tiny fishing villages, and sugar coated cottages. The landscape is unspoiled by tarmac and industry. Only fields and farmyards reign.

And as a child, The Lizard was the Summer destination, year, after year, with my parents and younger brothers. So it was a joy to return after nearly three decades. My memory, after all this time, still intact, held a vivid bygone portrait that accurately mirrored the present day. Nothing much had changed, apart from a better selection of ice lollies, and the lack of dubious role models - Punch and Judy anyone? ...

We feasted daily on Cornish ice cream (Little A introduced to the flavoured delights of chocolate, strawberry and hokey pokey honeycomb). We luncheoned on freshly baked pasties, Cornish Yarg, and plump apples. We Sunday roasted in a cliff top dining room overlooking the misty swell of the most southerly point of England. We ate locally caught fish and chips out of vinegary, salty, paper. And we scoffed three too many clotted cream teas; one afternoon, we found ourselves gorging on scones, piled chin high with jam and cream, in the front garden of a very hospitable farmer (she just happened to be selling homemade teas). The down side was that it attracted the unwanted company of determined, yet dozy, bees, and the unfortunate nostril pinching fragrance of manure, pigs, and chickens.

Little A thrived. She stroked miniature ponies. She watched cows being milked. She ran gleefully around and around the garden belonging to our holiday cottage, prodding snail shells, zig zagging after royal admirals. Sheltered under the leafy canopy of a giant rhubarb, she imagined the residents of a pair of antiquated gypsy caravans we'd discovered in the neighbouring meadow of a dairy farm. "Does the Gruffalo live in one of those tiny houses?" "Is this where Abney and Teal go on holiday?" She trekked up St Micheal's Mount, in a back pack, with Younger Dad. She built sandcastles, collected empty crab shells, hopped over baby waves. And she slept like a dream ...

Minack Theatre, Porthcurno

We revisited the hotel I stayed at when I was a child.  To my dismay, it was boarded up, paint peeling from the balcony windows, moss growing on the tennis court, the garden, wild and over grown. My mind threw flashes, recollective missiles, of times gone by. Aged nine, a tennis rookie, learning the ropes with Dad. Aged eleven, eating sweet cream cakes on the manicured lawn with mum. Aged thirteen, styled in a Frankie Says Relax t-shirt, pining after a boy ...

It was wonderful, liberating, not to feel the chains of my laptop for a week. I thought about my writing a little, the direction of my blog, the plot for a novel I have in mind (whether I am brave enough to pen my story is another matter). It was lovely to be away from the call of my inbox. I spent the days doing nothing much other than sightseeing, eating, and just spending quality time with my family; we played raucous games of 'moo, baa, meow,' as Younger Dad navigated the car cautiously down tractor wide lanes to our next port of call. On the beaches, I studied sand smoothed pebbles, and let myself melt, disappear, into the light buffeting of the on shore breeze and the reserved sound of waves gently breaking at low tide. I inhaled the present, and exhaled my worries, and for those five days I forgot about my higgeldy piggeldy life outside of Cornwall.

Good times ...

Mousehole Harbour

Such a wonderful holiday was had, albeit a fortnight ago, that I'm linking this post up with Reasons To Be Cheerful.