The Southwest Coast Path, Cornwall, England, 2015 by Linden B. (Lindy) Sisk

Day 8 - Walk from Port Isaac to Padstow

Please remember that each picture is a link to a larger version!

We had breakfast in the hotel, and began our walk through Port Isaac. One of the buildings we encountered was the Red Lion Inn, established in 1715, a reminder of how long this coast has been occupied by fishing villages. There are still some fishing boats in the harbor here, but now the main industry is tourism.

I have seen Britain referred to as a nation of gardners, and flowers were everywhere in the town.

I mentioned yesterday that Port Isaac is the location of the TV series Doc Martin, and we encountered the cast and crew on location at the house where his office and home are. We were asked to wait for about 2 minutes in the street below the house as they filmed a shot, as the path took us right in front of the home. When we got to the house, we could see Martin Clunes standing in front of the house talking to one of the crew. The street was rather crowded with people watching the show being filmed.

We continued on around to Port Quin, where we found a group of Outward Bound students, in wet suits and helmets, climbing up on a rock in the harbor and jumping into the very cool water. From the noise they were making, they were having a lot of fun!

We continued on. This day, the terrain was much less extreme than we had encountered on previous days. There was still a lot of elevation gain and loss — around 4600 vertical feet — but not nearly so steep, and with far fewer steps, which is what was creating problems for my knees. We saw a sailboat with two headsails, beating close-hauled into the stiff wind, surely a pleasant sail on a beautiful day.

We arrived around 3:00 PM in Polzeath, on Hayle Bay, a vacation beach town. Alex stopped in a store to pick up new sunglasses, which had broken. We stopped at a restaurant on the way out of town, with some of us having very good coffee, and others having ice cream cones.

Continuing around point into Daymer Bay, we passed what the map calls "The Doom Bar". Having seen boats attempting to cross the bar at the mouth of the Columbia River, I was not very impressed with the bar, but the tide was low, and perhaps it is more problematic under other conditions. We walked on to the sand to avoid a climb over a 250 foot hill, and continued on the sand on down toward the ferry landing, where we caught a ferry across the River Camel to Padstow.

Padstow is a very busy vacation destination, with a lovely harbor. We checked in to the hotel, and carried on with our usual routine of having a drink, taking showers, and, for some of us, doing laundry. Following an excellent dinner in the hotel bar, edited some of the pictures here, and went to bed. The weather forecast for the next day offers some showers, with the following day a high percentage chance of rain and thundershowers, and we may elect to ride to our destination that day, as walking in a thunderstorm over the terrain we have here is not a prospect that anyone thought was a good idea!

The adventure continues!

Lovely honeysuckle, which smelled as good as it looks.

The fictional home and office of Doc Martin, with crowd watching filming.

Martin Clunes, on the right Alex and Wilf on the left

Outward Bound class

Rapeseed(click the link)

Polzeath, on Hayle Bay

Our hotel, gray building, center

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