Plymouth, friends, Cornwall, Land’s End

On Friday 15th April we caught the First Great Western 11:06 from Paddington to Plymouth (an old HST Class 43 train for those that care! But very much renovated since the 1980s when I last travelled on one!) The train heads down along the coast at one point, at Dawlich and Teignmouth. For those that may recall a couple of years ago the line was cut at the coast here due to major damage from flooding – it just about subsided into the sea! Beautiful trip though, particularly at Dawlish. It’s the old Great Western Railway line into Cornwall, and goes through some really old stations like Exeter St David.

To get to Paddington in the morning we took our first London black cab from Victoria – a typically chatty and friendly cabbie.

Once in Plymouth it was winderful to catch up with Holly and Chris, who very kindly took us out for the evening, and then put us up for the night – followed by a marvellous cooked breakfast to get us going into Cornwall – thanks Hols and Chris!

Our hire car collected (a comfy black Mazda CX-5), we headed off over the Tamar river into Cornwall. We took a detour via Saltash, where Mum used to live, and then headed down to Land’s End. Along the way we saw St Michael’s Mount, a small island that you can walk to at low tide or catch a boat to at high tide. We just took some pictures.

It was cold at Land’s End, windy and chilly – but still sunny, our luck has held so far with the weather!

From there we headed back across North Cornwall to our accommodation at St Teath, a typically quaint little Cornish village. Our Airbnb hosts were Les and Diane – so hospitable, and an amazing little cottage, about 200 years old apparently. Diane makes a great fruit cake too… 🙂

Dinner at the local pub along with a pint of Cornwall’s Pride beer. Sleep!!

Some pictures here: