Coverack – Helford Passage
A varied day…
Waking to a heavy pancake of mist had me rolling over again in my little hostel bunk bed, so there really was no hope of an early start.
Persistent cloud cover kept the day kind of dreary, but there was still lots to entertain. For instance, the pebble beaches at Pedn-myin and Polcries looked vastly older than the landscapes I had thus far walked through. Everything looked worn – smoothed over by millenia. It felt strangely prehistoric.
The path also took rare turns inland to avoid quarries and MOD sites. This meant lane walking and lots of dodging cownpats, and some autumn colours. Unprotected from the wind, the trees along the immediate coastline drop their leaves the minute they start turning. This has meant the path is often strewn with crackly brown leaves. Seeing the brilliant reds and oranges further inland was a welcome surprise.
There were more ponies…
… and rough quarries…
… and curious sculptures…
… and a lovelly tea room serving a perfect Earl Grey brew…
(thanks Fat Apple).
Most excitingly, I crossed the half way point on the swcp.
There’s a massive stone plinth at Porthallow marking the spot, right before the fabulously named Snail’s Creep rocks. For some weird reason I didn’t take a phone pic of the inscribed stone (hmm, oh well). It was bitter sweet to get there anyway, since I still have a 18.8 km stint on the north coast to cover.
The other novel thing this day was that I had to cross two rivers – Gillan Creek and Helford River.
At Gillan I turned the orange board to call the ferry and a very smiley dude showed up in his tinny.
Unfortunately, when it was my turn to get onboard, the boat went one way and I went another. Somehow, I’m not exactly sure how, I ended up in the bottom of the boat with my sticks and The Beast, and one of my legs underneath me. A total pretzel move! I got out of it deep bruises on my left shin and hip, a strained right knee, bent sticks, and a dented ego. It all happened in slow motion, but was unavoidable from the first slip.
Much chuckling later, the boatman did his best to straighten out my sticks, but he couldn’t repair the rest.
I made quick work of looking around the tiny village of St. Anthony-in-Menage before pushing on for Helford and the next river crossing, which went much, much smoother.
Stats: 34992 steps; 193 floors; 24.28 km
PenLoper 