Coastal Cruise

What does Land's End and Doc Martin have in common? Correct - more typical UK weather. 

When first planning this world tour, the itinerary included walking part of the Salt Path, aka the SW Coastal Walkway, with one of Mary's cousins, Julia, and her partner Eric. Sadly, Julia suffered an ankle injury and the weather went out in sympathy. Time for a Plan B. 

Plan B was simple. Follow the South Cornwall coast around from Falmouth to Land's End, then the North Cornwall coast to Port Isaac. There may or may not be other suitably picturesque and historic Cornish fishing villages that are easier to get to, but Port Isaac was where the Doc Martin TV series was filmed, so Port Isaac it would be. 

The first significant milestone after leaving Falmouth was Penzance. Full disclosure - we probably only wanted to have a look because of the association with the Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera The Pirates of Penzance, which our high school staged in the year that Mary and I first met. 

I don't quite know what we expected.

Suffice to say that we have no photos of Penzance, and our exploration was limited to driving non-stop through the centre of town. That's a bit unfair on what is probably a nice town, but after all the other nice towns we had been through in Devon, Dorset and Cornwall we were probably a bit jaded. On we went. 

As we got closer to Land's End the surrounding countryside got suitably bleaker, not surprising considering how exposed it was to the weather. We expected only a carpark and a lighthouse, a bit like Cape Reinga back in NZ. 

What we got was a theme park. 

To be fair we were tempted by The Wallace and Gromit Experience, however resisted. Ignoring the pricey gift shops, we took the obligatory photograph and then headed out on the walkways. 

And guess what also runs through Land's End? 

We therefore had the opportunity to walk part of the Salt Path after all! Which we did. 

Part of the track went past the site of a relatively recent shipwreck, which is the only thing I can think of that may have inspired Mary for this photo:

After the theme park experience at Land's End we were wondering what we might find at Port Isaac. The answer was a quaint fishing village. 

The only nod to it's TV fame seemed to be metred parking, and one sign offering guided walking tours of the most common and well known film locations. Other than that, it seemed much the same as it always was, which was great. 

The only damper on our spirits was it started tipping down while we were exploring. We sheltered in a café, warming up with tea and coffee, and once the rain eased we scampered back to the car. All that was left was to drive back to Church Stretton. Easy? 

You wish... 

All through the trip there had been an issue with the in-car navigation deciding that the best route would be the physically shortest, and hence it had often directed us through numerous back country lanes rather than stick to the major roads. I lost count of the times we had to squeeze into roadside bushes to get past cars, trucks and tractors going the other way. 

Usually that wasn't a big issue, even though it inevitably took more time because there was no way to drive safely at the posted speed limits unless you knew the back roads well. Which I don't. 

However today the weather was appalling, and my stress levels were getting higher and higher as the sat nav had directed us down yet more stupidly narrow roads on the way to Port Isaac, now not just having to dodge other traffic but having to do it in poor visibility. 

Thus, when we were getting pushed for time on our self-imposed schedule to get back to Church Stretton and the sat nav tried to direct us again down stupidly narrow lanes I swore loud and long at the sadistic programmers responsible for the sat-nav system! Rather than submit to the machine, I instead drove directly back to the required motorway via beautifully formed, wide and smooth A Roads at the higher posted speed limits. Bliss! 

And my route only took us 2 hours longer.

Damn...