Left around 10am this morning and headed to Polperro. It is over the other side of the peninsula from Padstow, we had missed this area on our way to Brixham. Took about 50 minutes to get there. It is a 13 century fishing village, it has a very small, quaint harbour which we wandered around. Then we walked up around the head of the harbour and checked out the views. You can do some very long walks along the coast around here, we didn’t today ?
Next we headed to Looe, only a few miles away. It is a fishing and trading village, people have been on this area since 1000BC. We found some free parking, winning, we had paid £5 for an hour in Polperro. Greg managed to squeeze into a tiny spot.
We walked down to the harbour and bought a pasty for lunch and sat on the ground hanging our legs over the side of the harbours edge and ate them, lovely views over to the other side. After lunch we walked down the harbour to the sandy beach, full of tourists sunbathing and swimming was 22C.
Next we headed to Fowey. Instead of parking up the top which you seem to do in most of these little villages, we followed a car down the hill, these roads are really narrow, had no idea where we would end up, just when we were contemplating if we would go and park up the top of the hill, or head back to Padstow, Greg found a great free park. Really happy he did, we enjoyed Fowey, it was the major port on the south coast of Cornwall during the fourteenth century. These towns have a long, interesting history. Fowey has a good feel about it, was our favourite of the three we visited today.
We walked down to the Harbour, quite a few tourists in all of these towns. I don’t like to imagine how busy it will be here in the next two months, over the peak tourist time. Glad we are here now. The tourists atm in the south of England are mainly white Anglo saxons, with a few Europeans. In Kent there were also a lot of school classes of mainly French students of all ages.
As we left the harbour, a street behind, we came across the Fowey parish church of St Fimbarrus. We love the history of these amazing, old Church buildings that we have been able to go into. In 1152 there was a Norman church here, it was rebuilt in 1336, I find these dates mind boggling, so many people over the centuries have been here before us, it always gives me pause for thought.
I was taking photos as I do, of some gorgeous flowers that were in the church, a while later while googling the history of the Church I noticed there was a 12th century Norman font in the church. The flowers were sitting on top of it ?I went and took another photo that highlighted the Font, rather than the flowers ?it was a lovely Church to just be in, besides the history it contained.
Eventually we made our way back to the car and slowly, avoiding the tourists climbing back up the hill to the carpark drove the 45 minutes back to Padstow.
I had a nanna nap for an hour while Greg watched Australia beat the Poms in the cricket. He worked out how to stream Australian TV so he could watch it on his tablet. (VPN’s are very useful things). It is only on Pay TV here. Fortunately we can watch the Tennis. I am looking forward to watching Ash Barty play Wimbledon next week. Hoping she does well. It is a relief to have a hard working, decent, humble human representing us.
We are working to a daily budget, which is helping me to be mindful of the £ that disappear so easily and I am beginning to enjoy the challenge ?anyhow we had to fill the car with diesel today, 40 litres £55.00, (£1.35/litre or about $2.60 Aust) and just like that the budget is nearly blown. For dinner, we walked into town and got the last two seats in a small pizza place and shared a delicious pizza, and had it with water. Think we are £8 over for the day, but that is ok, I tally the budget each week and we have been under every week so far! ?. You would be impressed dad, don’t have a spreadsheet, but do have a lot of info about our spending and am enjoying the challenge.
Off to Clovelly, Tintagel & Port Isaac tomorrow.
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