Charlestown to Gorran Haven

Slightly longer and a lot more climbing - and plenty of mud of course. Komoot summary here.
So rewarding though, discovering places I never knew and a new character to the south coast of Cornwall. Pentewan beach for example:

We started in Charlestown where they're unfortunately closing the shipwreck and heritage centre but the sailing continues and someone's been digging offshore to find some old tin -

The walking today was pretty challenging with plenty of mud and just over 1,700 ft of climbing and we were soon into it out of Charlestown.


However there were plenty of wonderful beaches on the way that were a complete surprise, Porth Pean being one of the first.
There's very little to it at first glance but it has a promenade, cafe, toilets, sailing club and a sheltered beach. Ideal for my 5-15 year old self.

The path goes along the cliff tops but if that sounds like easy walking don't be fooled. There are considerable ups and downs, flights of steps to burn the quads, sunken paths not quite wide enough  and of course the mud. Some of the paths are so narrow that one is forced to put each foot exactly in front of the other, much as the models do on the catwalk. We've christened these the muddy catwalks.

It was beginning to dry today and the mud consistency had firmed from oxtail soup to chocolate cake mix. Lovely. If there's one thing you need for this, it's gaiters; they're a life saver. Well, not literally. It certainly makes for energy sapping progress. It takes some concentration, so much so that we found we'd already taken the optional detour out to Black Head before we realised. It is similar to a hill fort, as suggested on the OS map, with spectacular views all round.There's a memorial along here to the author and historian A L Rowse who wrote poetry about Cornwall.

First significant stop was Pentewan. Despite the rather overwhelming caravan park it is a beautiful little village and the pub/cafe was most welcoming even of our dishevelled and mud-spattered appearance.

Pentewan rather charmingly means ‘foot of the radiant stream’. In the 1920s Local land and quarry owner Sir Christopher Hawkins rebuilt the harbour to support the pilchard fishery and tin mining (from the stream working ‘Happy-Union’), and develop the town into a major china clay port. Sadly the mining silted up the port completely.

Once the breeding site of the Atlantic Grey Whale, there have been proposals to re-introduce them.  Although not visible from the SWCP, there is apparently a substantial submerged forest where oysters can be found latched on to the tree stumps.

Tim Renwick, once of Pink Floyd (1987 and 1994 tours), lives here.

Having lunched at the pub, we left for Mevagissey and had to take a long road detour to get round the caravan park. I'll spare you the descriptions of yet more hills, steps, and mud but there was plenty of everything.


Mevagissey next, a very impressive harbour with inner and outer sections and a considerable fishing fleet - surprisingly it's roughly the same number as the 60 or so that worked from here in its heyday in the 1880s when it used to be the centre of the pilchard fishing industry. The harbour was built on the site of a medieval quay in the 1770s and the outer harbour established by 1897. It is now owned by a charitable trust.




The town owes its name to the two saints, Meva and Issey, that neither of us had heard of. It's been around since the bronze age but known as Porthhilly (wonder why) until sometime in the 1700s. There's a model railway exhibition but even we seem to have outgrown that attraction and nothing was said as we passed it by.

The town has a park affectionately (not) known as Hilter's Walk after a somewhat authoritarian local councillor. Andrew Pears, of soap fame, was born here in 1768 and the Worzels wrote a song called "Mevagissey". Honestly, I think people should know this stuff.

Just beyond Mevagissey is the village of Portmellon. Much smaller and quieter, more unassuming. I stopped to talk with a woman removing large quantities of seaweed deposited by Storm Emma. She told us that Queen Elizabeth's first launch (I suppose the royal equivalent of first bike) was made in the boatyard here. It's now converted to cottages but the original family still live here. The view looking back was spectacular, now that the sun had appeared.






From here out to Chapel point, a superb location with just 3 houses there. Daphne du Maurier wrote about it in her novel "The House on the Strand". Just past these is Colona beach, probably the best we found on today's walk.

From here it was all hard slog. Although the mud was drying, and not quite so much of it, oh the hills.

We'd planned to get a bit beyond Gorran Haven, the next town on the SWCP but by the time we made it there, we'd just had enough.

Maybe 3 years ago when we started all this, but these two pensioners today admitted defeat and repaired to the cafe for tea and then a taxi home.

A quick word on Gorran Haven which looks a bit sleepy but that's because it's an unspoilt fishing village. Like many round here its origins are ancient but the pier dates from the 15th century.

The former head of MI6, Sir Richard Dearlove, was born here and the writer Colin Wilson came to live here in the 50s.

I hope you're revelling in the mud as happily as we are
'til the next time

Peter