Western Morning News (Saturday)
Walking in the footsteps of Marconi, Churchill... and Clark Gable
Martin Hesp savours the moment when, for him, winter changed into spring
We had all endured weeks of dark skies leaking copious amounts of rain – but in our case the weather, and indeed the season, seemed to change in one startling, blinding, beautiful moment. I was lying on a large comfortable bed, about to have a snooze after a long day out in Cornwall, and suddenly the hotel room was filled with the brightest sunlight we’d seen since last summer. So bright that my wife was forced to put on her sunglasses. It was that bright, even indoors!
But what made that moment really special was the sudden and unexpected noise. Not the most melodic sound in the world, but one that was wonderfully and hauntingly meaningful. It was the airy screeching of house-martins and swallows! Suddenly, there they were, scores of them circling the eaves of the grand Polrurrian Hotel, perched high on the Lizard’s west coast.
It marked the very moment they’d returned to these shores after overwintering in Africa. We’d not spotted a single one of these excited, soaring, darting birds so far this year. Certainly not up in our Exmoor homeland... But down there, just a couple of miles from England’s most southerly point, they suddenly appeared en masse. Entire squadrons of them. Screaming and weaving and soaring this way and that. The British mainland’s most southerly point at the Lizard is about 140 miles north of the nearest bit of the French coast – I don’t know if these tiny birds simply belt straight across but imagine it must be the case given that they wing-it all the way from Africa.
Anyway, I cannot remember a half hour like it. I have never before witnessed the changing of the seasons in such an instant and condensed form. Weeks of rain suddenly cast away by the intensity of the sunshine. Months of cold and storms brushed away by the aerial dance of magnificent flying creatures which had flown all the way from the tropics!
And we were fortunate, because that brief touch of summer did continue throughout our Cornish mini-break, which my wife and her friend Jayne booked online. Jayne is one of those people who has a genius when it comes to finding great deals on her iPad. A year ago we enjoyed a mini-break in Lisbon that was so inexpensive it was cheaper than staying at home. Now it was Cornwall’s turn, although I wasn’t holding out any hopes because the price of the special bed-breakfast and evening meal package at the Polurrian Hotel had me wondering how good it would be.
I need not have worried. It is a first-class establishment and I’d give it 10 out of 10. The Polurrian (www. https://www.polurrianhotel.com/) has fabulous sea-views – perched, as it is, on the sea-cliffs just outside Mullion – and it employs lovely, helpful staff who run the place with a friendly efficiency that you’d normally associate with a five-star establishment many times the price. It is comfortable and the food is really very good.
The hotel has quite a story. It has played host to all manner of visitors, including Guglielmo Marconi, Winston Churchill and even Hollywood’s Clark Gable. Marconi stayed there in 1901 while sending the first ever transatlantic radio messages from nearby Poldhu Cove. Eight years after his stay, a fire devastated the original building, destroying everything but the garden terraces.
A new hotel was built and the Polurrian became a hive of activity once again. During the Second
World War, the place was turned into an officers’ mess for nearby RAF Predannack and, in 1953, the heart-throb Gable stayed there with co-star Gene Tierney while filming the romantic thriller, Never Let Me
Go. You can see the original trailer on YouTube and there’s also a grainy clip showing an extraordinary black and white car chase through the cobbled streets of Mevagissey.
The Polurrian has recently undergone a refurbishment and the work on upgrading this wonderful place continues. We used it as a base to explore the Lizard peninsula, but there were plenty of nearby coastal walks to be enjoyed straight from the front door while the sun shone, including the one to lovely Poldhu
Cove where there is a wonderful beach cafe. More about those establishments in a moment...
Although it was sunny, there was a brisk chill wind blowing down from the north. Which puts the Lizard into a league of its own – because as the mainland’s most southerly zone it tends to be protected from anything that’s coming down from the Arctic.
I’d say that during the afternoon we spent at south-facing Kennack Sands just east of Lizard Point, we were the warmest and most protected enjoyers of the great outdoors anywhere in Britain.
I have seen this wonderful beach packed in high summer, but on this sunny April afternoon we were just about the only people there. While I pottered around studying the rock-pools on the far side of the steep little knoll which cuts Kennack Sands in two, my companions enjoyed cups of tea at the excellent little beachside cafe. There’s not one but two of these diminutive catering establishments beside this beautiful but out-of-the-way beach, and I salute the fact that they exist.
Because I am beginning to think that beach cafes are one of the jewels in Britain’s crown. Tiny, little-talked about jewels, maybe – but they are upping their game around the coasts and offering better and better food and drink as times goes by.
Indeed, we enjoyed an excellent and good value classic cream tea in one of the little cliffside huts right down on Lizard Point. From 100 feet above the shore we could see giant waves clashing with one another as they arrived from either side of the Lizard’s west and east coasts. As the ferocious wind blew and shook the cafe windows in that bright sunshine, we could watch as the famous local choughs wheeled acrobatically on the updrafts. I got a
few odd looks from the young and charming waiting staff for putting cream on my scones first, then jam – and was indeed informed this was not the Cornish way – but I am a Somerset boy, and must do what my mum told me.
Anyway, it was lovely sitting there down at the bottom end of England in that gale. Exhilarating even. I’ve heard the classic Westcountry cream tea described in many way before, but never exhilarating... By the way, in a couple of weeks’ time Hesp Out West will be reporting on what is perhaps the ultimate high tea to be found in all of England – if you can say that an island off the coast of Cornwall is actually in England...
During our stay on the Lizard we also visited wonderful Porthleven – alas, a fortnight early so that we missed the culinary splendours of the harbour town’s annual food festival, which is happening this weekend (details in the panel). And again, to give future Hesp Out Wests a plug, we will be visiting the town soon to find out why it has suddenly emerged to become one of the hottest foodie spots in the region.
But for now, this recent Lizard mini-break was exactly the sort of thing this series seeks to promote. It was, by most people’s standards easily affordable, and it was filled with the promise of interesting places to visit and great food to eat. It was, in a nutshell, a very do-able and achievable, adventure. And for me, it happened to mark the moment when winter changed into summer.
■ Martin would very much like to hear about ideas for Hesp Out West. If you have any thoughts on places he could visit, or things he could try, please email him at how@martinhesp.co.uk.