Wednesday 22nd April

Wednesday 22nd April

Another sunny day dawned... boots on plus coat and hat to start with but it was warm enough by the end.

I sometimes take my backpack with some water and maybe the proper camera or binoculars but sometimes I just slip a small bottle of water into my pocket - today was one of those days.

I decided it was another Cot Valley day but to avoid the quite long narrow section of path that is my most frequent route, I headed across the play ground and football pitch and walked down the road instead.

There is a point (after the llamas/ostriches) where a side road heads off to the right, at  Carallack.  (Following this little side road takes you to some houses perched high above the valley where it becomes a footpath wending its way to Carn Gloose.)  Just a little way along this road you can climb a steep stile on your left which it takes you across a sloping meadow then straight down into the valley by the very steep path that I came up the other day.

Now the copse of small trees is full of bluebells! 

It is beautiful.

However, this path is so steep in places that it is not good for the knees! 

I will not repeat the route in that direction - I'd rather come up it!

Eventually back to the road on the valley floor where a couple, possibly visitors, took a path off to the left so I carried on on the road and clambered over the rocks to find a comfy perch! 

I sat a while - only the sound of the sea and the occasional birdsong.

These rocks are superb.

I scrambled up the small cliff to the south to have a view of Land's End, the tide was quite low and you can see it wasn't quite a clear day yet.

The lichen covered rock is wonderful with the colours of the sea.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      As I turned to head back home there was the distinctive cry of a chough, it pecked away at the earth hunting grubs near to me and then flew off to continue its hunt further away. I usually see choughs every time I am walking, usually in groups. The most I've counted at one time was 14 when I was playing golf!                                                                                                                     I wanted to avoid the narrow section of path again on the way home so I headed up past the Youth hostel and a little way up that road before turning left on to a footpath which goes back across the valley past the beautiful house where Francie's friend had a pottery(?)  and across  two extensive cow's fields to Bosavern where the community farm is - then it's just the walk back up over the Carn to home. I'm not keen to walk across fields with cows in but fortunately they were all sat up in a top field and I skirted across the side of the valley out of sight!

Back home for breakfast - porridge (with cinnamon and banana) and freshly ground coffee courtesy of Ben and Rosie from Dog and Rabbit Cafe. (The cafe is closed because of Cv19 but they had coffee beans that needed using so I am the happy recipient of a bag!)

Sudoku, phone calls, word games and the jigsaw kept me busy for the rest of the day, and I also emailed my MP about the S Korean approach to getting on top of this, using Phil and Tim's experience of day to day life in Korea. 

The way we have dealt with this... and continue to deal with it, is heartbreaking. If we don't put measures in place soon it only compounds the errors we've made... we need to test, contact trace, isolate with support then follow up, we have got to act now.

A positive note to end on, I have a fig tree in my garden and the new leaves are a vibrant green, especially with the sun shining through them.