CAERLOGGAS DOWNS, CORNWALL
Tom Ough walks reclaimed land with his godfather guide
“And that conical mound over there,” says Jonathan, pointing, “is known as the Sky Tip.”
I follow the line of his finger. We’re on some elevated scrubland, so we have a pretty good view of the land around us, including said Sky Tip. It is a vast slag heap created by Cornwall’s china clay industry, and it appears to be a locus of regional pride. A flag of St Piran flutters on its chalky peak. This has got to be worth a google, I think to myself.
Jonathan, who is my godfather, is taking me and my girlfriend Helen for a walk on Caerloggas Downs. Like the Sky Tip, the downs are old china clay land, and are now in the process of rewilding. On both sides of the path are bushes of thick gorse, interspersed with delicate lilac foxgloves.
Our brief had been to find an easy walk, which usually involves some trade-off. In general, I’d say there’s an inverse correlation between a walk’s accessibility and its spectacle: the best views require the highest climbs. But Jonathan, who is a member of the local walking group and has lived in this part of Cornwall as long as I’ve known him, has presented, in this walk on Caerloggas Downs, an exception to that rule. It’s easy (you can drive to the top of the heath, saving yourself the walk up the hill) yet scenic. He shows us a nascent eco village beside the Sky Tip; a sliver of the Celtic Sea; the hill that conceals the geodesic domes of the Eden Project.
The walk is only a mile or so long, but it’s an excellent snapshot of Cornwall’s south coast. Later, I look up the Sky Tip, as I’d resolved, and learn that local patriots (Cornwall has a nationalist movement, after all) have, for years, been repeatedly planting the flag at the top of the mound. Just a few weeks before our trip, the patriots persuaded Imerys, the mining company that manages the mound, to install a permanent flag.
This means the campaigners can return to their previous goal: securing Unesco World Heritage Site status for their beloved Sky Tip. As an ancestral Cornishman, I offer them my full support in this difficult endeavour. Alas, our easy walk has led to an uphill struggle.