Pooped in Portwrinkle
Friday 16 November, 2018
Today was neither here not there. It was neither too long or too hard, and had the sun been shining, I would have wandered along quite happily. The sea mist was there when I woke up, although thankfully not as heavy as last night, when it was like floating drizzle. It lifted a little as I left my digs at Schooner Point and started down towards Seaton, but by the time I got to Downderry – a very run down beach suburb – it thickened up.
So it was a grey plod, beside the grey sea and above the grey cliffs and grey sands. South Cornwall does industrial strength jagged rocks – the faulting and tilting is quite amazing.
The interesting part of the day has been the Whitsand Bay Hotel – it’s closing for good in ten days after a century of operating as a hotel. The building dates back to the 1870s when it was the family mansion of the Graves family. Then someone moved it stone by stone to Portwrinkle and turned it into a hotel. No one seems happy about it and the staff are pretty down, but the place is pretty full as old customers come down for a last golf holiday.
Tomorrow is quite exciting as I walk to Cremyll and the Tamar ferry around Rome Head – those echoes from Peter Duck. The weather is set to improve for the weekend, before the winter arrives with a vengeance on Monday, taking the temperatures from the low teens to 7 or 8 degrees. No more cooked breakfasts after tomorrow: I won’t be burning the kilojoules!
