wild coastal CORNWALL
Don’t forget to pack your camera as you explore the stunning coast and countryside of this land of legends around Tintagel and Boscastle
My socks were flecked with the dried seedheads of grasses from the meadow. I sat down on the cliff edge and took off my shoes, putting them down carefully between the pretty purple flowers of autumn squill.
Looking out to sea I met The Sisters, twin rocky islets a few hundred yards offshore, which were festooned with breeding seabirds. I listened to the sounds of guillemots on the ledges and raised my binoculars to pick out razorbills and shags.
The scent of their colony enveloped me in the soft westerly breeze as I began to sink into a soporific state. The honks and croaks of passing ravens gliding by did nothing to interrupt my trance, but a piercing screech brought me to my senses. A young peregrine pleaded with its parents for food, harrying them as they soared nonchalantly above.
I was on a headland called Willapark, only a stone’s throw from the Caravan and Motorhome Club’s site at Trewethett Farm. My wife, Sarah, and I were on our way to Tintagel via the coast path. We had a date with King Arthur – and we weren’t going to be late!
The legend of King Arthur is an oft-romanticised story, much adapted over many centuries since the life story of King Arthur, purportedly factual, was first presented in the twelfth century book The History of the Kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth. The story was given credence by Earl Richard, second son of King John and brother of King Henry III, when he built a castle on the headland at Tintagel around 1230.
It was believed that King Arthur was conceived on this headland and the Earl was obviously aiming to benefit from an association with this legendary figure. Subsequently, to enhance the connection, Earl Richard set about creating the settings from various Arthurian stories around his castle and, through his actions, the legend of King Arthur was perpetuated. The true story of Arthur may never be known because reality has become lost in a mix of fables and fantasy, though almost a millennium on we are still captivated by him.
There is no doubt that the setting of Tintagel Castle is incredibly beautiful and its history began long before the fabled King Arthur put in an appearance. The narrow isthmus, which once connected the mainland to the headland, collapsed in the Middle Ages.
The island, as it became known, is now owned by English Heritage. Since our last visit 12 years ago a rather imaginative sculpture of King Arthur has been installed at the furthest point of the island.
An impressive bridge, decked with local slate, connects the mainland and the island along the route that Earl Richard would have taken. It’s a cantilevered affair, with a gap in the middle. Yes, there is meant to be a small gap between the two halves of the bridge (in fact, if you get to the middle and there isn’t a gap, that’s the time to get worried).
The bridge’s slate came from Delabole, one of only a handful of slate quarries left in the county.
For at least six centuries slate has been dug at some incredible
Cornish locations. As we walked the coast path between Trewethett and Boscastle next day, we found evidence of such quarrying at several spots. There are some beautifully crafted slate walls partway down the cliffs, which once had winches or cranes to lower bundles of slate onto boats waiting in the coves below.
Dominating the coastline near Boscastle is a lookout on a headland which shares its name with the headland near Tintagel; Willapark (meaning ‘enclosure with a view’). This headland was an Iron Age cliff castle defended by a ditch and rampart across its narrow neck.
There are remains of many such fortifications around the Cornish coast. Though historians have yet to come up with a definitive reason for their presence, it is probably connected to the wealth that the county has enjoyed from valuable commodities such as copper, tin and slate.
Boscastle has an interesting history centred around its old harbour, which saw a peak of activity in the nineteenth century when a variety of goods such as coal and limestone from south
Wales and fertiliser from Bristol were imported. Although the innermost harbour is well protected from storms, the entrance to the outer harbour has always been extremely difficult to navigate so sailing ships were assisted by ‘hobbler’ boats with eight oarsmen. Some were further assisted by people using ropes from either side of the channel.
Tourism in Boscastle, which began in the middle of the nineteenth century, is now the mainstay of the local economy. More recent history includes the devastating flood of August 2004 when an incredible deluge of rain in a very short period caused the River Valency to burst its banks and literally rip the heart out of the village. It was rebuilt with better flood defences, but the same character as before and Boscastle remains one of Cornwall's most picturesque harbour villages.
Picturesque for yours truly means photography. If, like me, you enjoy being creative with your camera, Boscastle is a good place to come. There are plenty of close-ups to be had of rusty old chains, worn mooring posts, patterns in the weathered slates and characterful old buildings.
For wider views of the harbour I would recommend visiting at high tide – although I failed on that front. It’s disappointing to see boats lurching on their sides in mud when they were made to be bobbing about in the water!
Sarah and I enjoyed walking the various paths to get differing views of the valley and village, but the best position I found for photographs was at the top of Penally Hill. From here there are two views; one facing southeast towards the village and the other to the southwest, which includes Willapark headland, the distant coastline and the channel to the open sea beyond.
In summer there are heather and bell heather on the slopes which can be used as foreground interest. Given the angles of view, I found that just before sunset is a good time to take pictures.
Looking for further photographic inspiration on the next fine day, we headed south on the coast path from Tintagel to Trebarwith Strand. Beyond Tintagel the coast path becomes less arduous as it crosses an area known as Glebe Cliff. We had a moment of magic as we stopped beside a small spring to admire the wild chives growing in the damp ground when a skylark sang overhead and a pair
of dark green fritillaries glided along the grassy slope.
A little further, at Treknow Cliff, the landscape is completely dominated by its history of slate quarrying. There is a series of obvious features, including a massive opencast quarry with tall pinnacles of slate left standing.
Quarrymen working here were dangled on ropes over the edge of the cliff to chip away at the best bits of slate. The pinnacles of rock that we see nowadays were left behind because they were of inferior quality.
Once quarried, the slate was taken to the nearby Penhallic Point, where there was a wharf. Given the health and safety requirements of our modern-day life, I find it astonishing to learn that slate was quarried here, in this way, until 1937. Nowadays it’s just fulmars, kestrels, peregrines and ravens that hang around on the quarry’s cliffs.
From Treknow Cliff it’s only a short walk to the hamlet of
Trebarwith Strand, yet another great photographic location. At the foot of the main street the road leads into a narrow cove, with a deep gulley carved out of its slate foreshore by a small stream.
At high tide the waves break into the gulley, creating a cauldron of spume. I’ve seen many photographs which use this feature and most are taken at sunset. I actually found the view to be just as appealing in the morning when the sunlight catches on the near face of the offshore island known as Gull Rock.
This is a location where I enjoyed experimenting with long exposures, the effect of which is to blur anything that moves, so the sea becomes milky. I particularly like the effect here because the moving water contrasts so well with the sharp, rugged nature of the slate. If the tide is high it isn’t safe to venture any further out into the cove, but the view from the south side (by the pub) looking north is very good and can be
dramatic when waves break onto the rocks.
We were blessed with a good week of weather, but there were a couple of days when the clouds rolled in, making it difficult to even find the toilet block. With the coast cloaked in mist ,we walked inland from the site to St Nectan’s Glen. It took about 40 minutes to get to the waterfall, with most of the way along an attractive, steep-sided, heavily wooded valley beside a small stream which looked quite atmospheric, veiled as it was in mist.
The waterfall is a stunner. I was glad to have released a few moths from my wallet to enable us to see it (there’s a small charge to visit). There are two pieces of equipment that I regard as essential for photographing waterfalls in dark places. First, a tripod because exposures in dark valleys are too long to hand-hold a camera and, second, a polarising filter because this removes some of the shine from wet surfaces, such as rocks, allowing the colour to come through.
The third piece of equipment that turned out to be essential was a pair of wellies because the classic view of the waterfall is only found by standing in the shallow stream. Sarah hadn’t brought hers, so she slipped my size 11 wellies on and slithered her way into the stream whilst I stood on the damp bank in my stockinged feet.
I found it slightly ironic that it was I, the one with the wellies, who departed with wet socks!
The next day brought better weather again and our trip ended in much the same way as it began, enjoying the beautiful coastline close to the site. Sunset on our final evening was spent beside the Ladies’ Window, an arch cut through the slate high on the cliffs.
Here I watched auks coming and going to their nesting colony on Short Island. I photographed the tremendous view along the coast to the north and felt a sense of satisfaction that we had explored this relatively small part of the Cornish coast thoroughly and come to understand the place a little better. It was a shame we had to leave, but we had no choice; I didn’t have any clean socks left.