Ducks woke me up. They had found something funny and were quacking about it together on the mill pond behind the tent. My watch alarm is set for a little later on Sundays and the wake up call was welcome.
Nonetheless we still managed to leave half an hour later than typical after breakfast and packing camp. The trudge back to the coast path down the extra tarmac miles that you needed to do to get to the campsite never seem so bad in the morning. After walking all day they are interminable. Car parks were already full and cars were backed up in the lanes and being directed by hi-viz staff to wherever it is you put cars at 9am on the last bank holiday Sunday morning in Cornwall. Fathers had emptied out families and beach stuff to walk down the road while they queued to park.
Back on the coast path and coasting away from the Crantock beach you would never know it was a busy day. Paths to Pentire Point West, Kelsey Head and around to Holywell were sandy and steady, popular only with dog walkers and visitors that like a Sunday morning stroll.
Holywell beach had large dunes to traverse before we were allowed into the coffee shop. Paths cross-crossed in every direction and while I think there were posts with arrows to direct you Kim tends to miss them at the best of times. At a high point we sighted on the cafe and followed the compass to freedom, cappuccino and a raspberry flapjack.
We stretched and emptied the sand from our shoes before getting back out onto the headlands while avoiding old mineshafts, military training areas and the usual cliff edges.
Rounding the end we saw one of the main geographical features of the day. Perran Bay is a 3km long beach and the tide was out so we could walk it all.
Our starting end was almost deserted, with a few walkers, a surfer seeking a swell away from the crowds and a lifeguard on a quad bike doing the rounds in 6km laps. Walking beaches like these you don’t seem to get any closer to the other end nor any further from where you started. There were large caves that distracted Kim from the trudge briefly. It only took around 45 minutes but it felt a lot longer. At this end we were back in a high population density area and navigated around beach cricket, beach tennis, beach throwy whistly thing and kite fliers to the off ramp.
We grabbed cold cans from a surprisingly quiet shop next to an unsurprisingly busy cafe that we did not want to queue for. We keep leapfrogging a German or Austrian couple also walking the path and they waved to us from inside as we passed.
The paths out to St Agnes Head were a delight. Old quarries, adits, mineshafts and cliffs with holes cut out of them. It was difficult to identify what was natural and what man-made. The path was good and we must have passed through more than one Doctor Who set.
The Perranporth airfield is now a race track and the sounds of the sea were drowned by the accelerations and screeched turns of drivers looking for their limits. Lunch was intended at Trevaunance Cove but it was so busy that it fed Kim disappointment and few calories. She struggled later in the day as a result.
Passing Man and his man, the two rocks out from St Agnes Head, and then turning south gave more altered cliffs and workings. Kim found an adit and started in. The temperature inside was cool and it ran at a steady level cut to the shape and almost the height of a man.
The coastline north of Chapel Porth had well preserved buildings from Cornish mining. Clifftop engine houses and stacks were commonplace as we moved south.
We had a few climbs through the day which were welcome, breaking up the angle for feet and minds. Down to Chapel Porth on tired legs towards the end to the sheltered cove being enjoyed by the remaining families we crossed the valley and climbed over the last hill on the path for today and down into Porthtowan. Unfortunately the only campsite we could book for the evening was a further 2.5km up hill and along major roads with few pavements. As usual cars were a greater risk than the cliff tops and mineshafts.
We are closing on Lands End, our first goal now only 45 miles away. We aim just short of St Ives for tomorrow and will then get out onto the foot of Great Britain. My feet hurt.
32km and 942m of ascent.