Mevagissey to Charlestown, 13 km, 542m climbing

‘Walk towards the good in life and one day you will arrive’. Leviticus

There was rain overnight and a shower just before breakfast but by the time we started it was all over and blue sky was on its way. It is very lush on the south Cornish coast and often the path is overgrown thigh high with bracken, thistles, nettles, ferns, grass, rape seed, wild flowers etc. The path is given a haircut by volunteers armed with petrol driven edge trimmers and most of it is very good for walking. The barber was overdue on today’s section and all the thigh high foliage was wet from the rain. It didn’t take long for us to have saturated shorts/trousers, socks and shoes, Squelch, squelch, squelch. We have been very lucky. Today is only the second day I can remember having wet feet.

Mevagissey to Charlestown, although short, is considered one of the toughest on the south Cornish coast (ie from about The Lizard east) but we found it pretty comfortable going. After a few undulations the first obstacle was getting around a huge beachside holiday park, The Sands, at Pentewan. The beach is beautiful but it is owned by the park and so we had to walk inland on a busy road to get around it. Only rarely on the whole South West Coast path have we had to walk alongside a busy road and we had become blasé to the pleasure it is to walk completely isolated from the noise and smell of traffic. Pentewan is a small and unassuming hamlet squashed hard by the coast and the caravan park.

From Pentewan the path did get decidedly more dramatic with a series of sharp ascents and descents leading to Black Head. Whoever set out the route seems to have taken a perverse pleasure in seeking out gradients to climb rather than easier crossings of cliff top fields. Black head is the location of another iron age hill fort and is probably one of the easiest to imagine as being a fort. Another few ups and downs including two with 90 very high steps and we were entering Charlestown.

On our way out of Mevagissey this morning we stopped at Martins Bakery (no apostrophe?) and bought two pieces of bread pudding. This is not to be confused with bread and butter pudding which is an almost soufflé-like dessert. Bread pudding is more like a dense, soft cake or slice and can be picked up by hand. Bread and butter pudding is soft and custardy. They both have basically the same ingredients: stale bread, spices, sultanas, milk, egg, sugar and other fruit, sherry, brandy etc as you like. You can’t eat too much bread pudding – it is pure stodge – a great comfort food. We had to eat our two slices in two sittings about 2 hours walking apart.

We are now in the unspoilt harbour town of Charlestown and staying for two nights in the Rashleigh Arms Hotel. The town is named after a local landowner, Charles Rashleigh, who partly developed it in the late 18^th century as a port for the booming china clay industry. Its once thriving dock is now a Shipwreck, Rescue and Heritage Centre. Upon completion, Charlestown was a model Georgian ‘new town’ and to this day the town retains much of this character and is a popular for film and television locations eg Poldark. Charlestown capitalises on its past by harbouring a few square rigger sailing ships.

We arrived in Charlestown about an hour before check-in time so had a late lunch (Hunter’s Chicken for B, green Thai curry for P) under the trees in the Rashleigh Arms garden. A very nice end to the day. The only down side is our hands and legs are still tingling from all the nettles we pushed through today. Not painful but just a strange sensation.

Tomorrow we go to see the nearby Eden Project.