Back in Mevagissy

Friday 24 August 2001. We head back to Mevagissy, having had to cut short our stay there on our first day on discovering there was no available room at the inn. Or B+B... Or boatshed which is their equivalent of a stable...

Once again I screw my nerves up and drive along the narrow road with the sheer drop to the sea water and marine fuel mix that fills the harbour to the car park at the end.

Mevagissy's harbour has enough going on though, for us to ignore the weather. In fact for most of the week the entire country is bathed in glorious sunshine except for ... Cornwall.

The old lifeboat is being restored. The current one is a bit more orange and low slung and quite a bit less ancient. I have every respect for lifeboat crew who, regardless of the danger to themselves, will go out in all weathers to the aid of people in distress at sea whether it be through wind, sea conditions, mechanical breakdown or sheer stupidity.

As Registrar of a Nautical College I have been under instruction at the controls of a rigid inflatable fast rescue craft as it left the top of a 30 foot (9.14 metre) wave to sudddenly drop like a stone. I know how frightening that can be in what suddenly seems a very small boat indeed.

They have some very strange stuff in some of the shops here... Though I'm betting this chap wasn't caught lurking off the coast of Mevagissy!

It had started to rain. We had a coffee in a harbourside cafe hoping that the rain would stop and the sun would come out, but when it didn't we returned to the car.

We sa in the car for a while and I attempted to sketch the buildings on the far side of the harbour but they were too far away to see any detail and the rain running down the car windscreen didn't help much. Join us next time for a look at some wonderful musical machines!

Index getting nearer and nearer...

Looe in The Rain, 2001

Thursday 23 August 2001. Looe is a place we had often driven through but up until today had never found a parking space!

The weather since leaving Polperro has turned grey. It looks like we can expect a bit of rain any time...

However it is by now four o'clock and we want a quick look round and somewhere to eat our meal before heading back towards Newquay.

Looe sits either side of the River Looe (lucky coincidence there...) and the two halves are West Looe and East Looe.

It's one of those harbour walls that can make parents or people with little sense of balance extremely nervous as there are no railings, just one second a firm footing and the next a long drop to either a splash, a muddly squelch (depending on the tide) or a thud as you hit some poor unsuspecting skipper's deck...

There were certainly still lots of people thronging, if not getting in the way of everyone else. We settle on an ancient inn called the Golden Guinea. I had that traditional Olde English meal, sweet and sour pork with rice... Fran had a modern roast beef!

Doesn't this fill you with pride? By now it is raining. The great British public have come on holiday determined to have a good time and...

"Dad I'm wet!"
"Shut up. We've come here to enjoy ourselves, so get on with it!"
"But my salmon paste sandwiches are wet and soggy..."
"Easier to chew - stop complaining!"

We are walking back towards the car park. The kids are still watching their Grandads catching crabs and are keen to show you their captives in their buckets.

The fishing trips are returning also with their catches. Er... just one bucket, lads? Were you trying?

We find a collection of old clockwork cine cameras dating from the 1940s-1950s in a photographic shop window.

Once I finish the series I'll add an index page

Polperro 2001

Thursday 23 August 2001. We are once more at one of my favourite places. Polperro in Cornwall. You can find many articles of Polperro from different holidays on this blog, so let's try to find some different photos for this time.

We had taken the scenic route which involves a trip over the River Fowey on a small chain-driven car ferry. There was a mini coach of American tourists at the front of the queue. They were looking dubiously at the angle of the slipway and the clearance under the coach. As the driver took the coach up onto the ferry the front wheels went up onto the ferry alright but the bodywork tipped the coach up and the section behind the rear wheels went down, scraping the back of the coach on the slipway with a prolongued crunching noise.

We had to leave our own car at the top of Polperro's hill and walk down to the village. A small group of people were pointing with lots of "Oohs" and "Awws" at the stream which runs down a channel at the side of the road. Once we caught up with them we saw the reason - a clutch of tiny ducklings struggling against the current and continually being chased and rescued by their mum!

In all our visits there, we had never taken advantage of a boat trip. So this time we duly climbed onto a boat and sat near the back on the crowded bench, breathing the heady smell of... well I'd like to say salt water and ozone, but it was more like marine diesel and burning oil, so close to the engine!

There were some nice views of Polperro harbour and the village itself towering over us on the hills on either side. As we passed high rocks the skipper passed round a postcard showing winter waves crashing over the top of them.

We sail and sputter along the coast for 15 minutes then turn back. As we approach the harbour again we pass these caves at the back of a small sandy beach.

So once we get off the boat we head for the beach for a closer look.

It is our chance to explore the cave. It goes back a long way and it's fun to wonder how many casks of smuggled brandy it has seen in Polperro's darker periods of history!

The weather is warm and sitting with the sketch book seems a good idea! The harbour entrance has a stack of huge square concrete blocks which may look improbable on the drawing but it is accurate, honest! Well.. apart from the fact that my photograph of the scene shows five, not four, big square slabs of stone!

An index will apprear once all articles form the holiday have been published

2001 Cornwall Pilgrimage

Wednesday 22 August 2001. Fran and I set off for a few days in Cornwall. Mevagissy, our chosen destination this time, is sunny but full - there are no rooms to be had.

Mevagissy is one of those delightful villages and fishing harbours so typical of Cornwall. Some of the roads are perilously narrow and indeed the way to the car park is to drive along the quayside. Meeting someone coming the other way and you are sweating at the nearness of the unrailed drop to the harbour bottom to your side.

Whilst Hartlepool has a much more detailed version of the hanged monkey spy, local legend tells of a similarly unfortunate simian who was the sole survivor of a shipwreck during the Napoleanic Wars. Never having seen such a creature before the villagers thought it must be a French spy and hanged it on the beach. I would have thought it would have been better to hang it from something higher off the ground but then there's (possibly untrue...) a wall somewhere with a sign that a King was born there. So if a king can be born halfway up a wall....

Just to finish the Mevagissy portion of our story with something that is definitely true: Andrew Pears, the man who founded Pears Soap was born here in 1768.

Disappointed at our inability to stay in Mevagissy, we head for familiar territory and head for Newquay and Porth. The campsite at Porth has no vacancies but we find a room at a nearby B+B so all is well.

With a sigh of relief we can head for our favourite walk onto Porth Island. We can hear the steady boom of the blow hole at the far end and get to see it in all it's working glory. Get ready...

BOOM! The sea has worn a smooth shaft into the side of a large inlet and each wave hits it at speed and is diverted up and back outwards. Very spectacular!

An index will be forthcoming, just dig deep for your patience until I get round to it!

UK Places Index

This Index Page covers UK Towns and Cities not necessarily covered anywhere else. However readers can also try the Work Index which also has many non-work descriptions of town as well as the various Curiosities Index Pages.

Read about our adventures by clicking/tapping the photos below. A link on each page will bring you back here.

Manchester Index

A collection of articles covering the city of Manchester in the UK. Known as England's Second City, it was Roman Mancunium and rose to huge prominence due to the wool industry during the Industrial Revolution.

Each article can be accessed by clicking or tapping the photographs below. A link at the end of each article will bring you back to this index page.

UK Places Index

Manchester 1998

Manchester was the "Big City" when I was young. A regular Saturday morning trip by train took us from home to the city and the afternoon would be a mooch around various shops and a stop at the burger cart that inevitably was serving at the top end of Market Street.

By the 1990s Market Street had changed out of all recognition. Outside Lewis's the road had been taken over by the platforms for a new tramway system. It was the first city to bring back trams when the Metrolink system opened in 1992, with the intention of extending the system into outlying towns, taking over existing railway routes or by the laying of new tracks. In the background, right, the Arndale Centre was a large totally enclosed shopping centre.

Built between 1971 and 1979, the first phase opened in 1975. It had a tower containing business units and at ground and first floor levels were shopping outlets. Unfortunately the outside of the building was covered in dull yellow ceramic tiles described variously as "distinctly lavatorial" and similarly "The longest toilet wall in the world". It replaced many streets, mostly of Victorian buildings and several dubious areas where "young men were fleeced" and "young women were forced into prostitution".

For myself I always thought it a great shame that the small collection of market stalls on Shudehill that sold second-hand books and records all disappeared...

On the 15th June 1996 the IRA left a van parked between Marks and Spencer and The Arndale Centre on Corporation Street. It contained a 3,300lb (1500kg) bomb which exploded in the later morning causing a huge amount of damage over some 40+ streets. Over 200 people were injured and it was a miracle that no-one was killed.

Marks and Spencers was condemned as was Longridge House where Dad had worked for the British Engine Insurance Company for many years before the family moved to Blackpool in the mid 1970s.

Work to clear the site took a long time. This was taken on the 9th April 1998 and is of the space left where the Marks and Spencers store was. Previously the view of the cathedral would have been blocked by Longridge House and others.

Manchester's cathedral is of the Perpendicular period (15th Century), though it was badly damaged by bombing in the Second World War. The 130ft tower was rebuilt in 1867. As I entered, I was accosted by an elderly lady who was acting as a Cathedral Guide. "Most of us are in our 80s," she confided, "...but I'm only 72!"

Still too old for me, Dearie...!

The interior is somewhat dark. Originally in a dark sandstone the stonework was coated in Roman cement (it has nothing to do with the Romans) but this damaged the stonework which was replaced by an equally dark grit stone in the second half of the 19th century.

The Midland Hotel in Oxford Square is a superb example of a 19th Century railway hotel. Manchester was served by the London Midland and Scottish (LMS) Railway Company.

The Barton Arcade of 1871. The ground floor contains shops and the upper floors, offices of solicitors, insurance and other such companies.

On a corner of Corporation Street is a pre-fish and chip shop eating place - Mr Thomas's Chop House. Established in 1867 typical fare would be lamb or pork chops and mashed potatoes.

So until next time - emjoy your chops!

Manchester Index

Manchester, 1970

Seeing as we have gone way back in time for the last few entries, let's have a look at Manchester as it was in 1970.

On Market Street, Debenhams had yet to take over Pauldens department store opposite the well established Lewis's. The trams and trolley buses had disappeared in the 1950s and the Metro trams were not to appear for another 25 years.

The Swinging Sixties had only just finished and mini skirts were gradually being replaced by flared trousers and maxi and midi skirts.

Piccadilly Gardens were still gardens - a mini park on the square at the top of Market Street. It was a place to sit and enjoy the flowers and lawns and the benches along the pathways. Across the road from the gardens Wellington House was still the home of the BBC in Manchester.

Mosley Street runs towards Market Street behind the camera - it's a long time since I've been to Manchester but since the introduction of the tramway system, Market Street seems to have been split into two with the side that contained Lewis's (later Primark) being called Fountain Street. I'm not quite sure how the two sides of a street can have different names, but there you go...

Anyway, this is still Mosley Street in the days when it was common to see two Triumph Herald cars next to each other.

I used to take the train every Saturday with my mate Alex and our first stop would be the burger cart on the corner of Pauldens. Burger were both yummy and eatable without quite as much mess as they inevitably produce today. A 2oz patty was considered standard and accompaniments were fried onions which stacked on a hot plate helped keep the burgers warm, mustard, tomato ketchup and nothing else. No salad, no pickle just a very tasty burger that you could expect to stay pretty much together whilst you ate it. Bring back those days! And whilst you're at it, let's have a Wimpy back on every High Street!

You can only see the very start of the word on the cart, but burgers were still hamburgers at this time. Trading Standards later demanded they be renamed beef burgers as they weren't made of ham, but the name came from the place burgers were first made - Hamburg in Germany.

Manchester Index