January 10, 2023
From the Castle Cary train station, we “did a shop” in Street (that’s a town.) It seems to me that we “did a shop” almost every other day. And the washing machine was going 24/7—more about that later. On that first day, Sue took me around Clark’s Village, an outlet mall built on the site Read the Rest…
January 8, 2023
When I told people I was spending Christmas with my cousins in an English village, I heard a fair amount of “that sounds magical.” I don’t think my cousins think of themselves as magical even if they do live in a place with things like fairy soap, fairy lights and fairy cakes Read the Rest…
April 15, 2020
There are two Marks and Spencers in all of Cornwall; we stopped at the one in St Ives to get whatever we might need for the last evening of the holiday. We had to choose food for two meals, use the toilets and have tea in the café– one always has tea in the café Read the Rest…
April 11, 2020
Covid-19 (and my own laziness) has interrupted my travelogue of last September’s UK adventures. I’d been a week on Islay in Scotland, then drove with my cousins in Somerset to Morvah, Cornwall. It seems a very long time ago and it has done me good to revisit my journal and remember. Here is installment thirteen: Read the Rest…
February 9, 2020
Still at Zennor ( see previous post) we had lunch at the Old Chapel Café. I discovered Cornish crab, which I afterwards ordered every chance I got. As we were leaving I got engrossed in seeing how an old iron ship part functioned as a doorstop. I pulled it away and watched the door swing Read the Rest…
January 26, 2020
Our Celtic Spirituality Morning gave way to lunch at The Cook Book in St Just. Once a bookshop/café, now it’s a café with books for décor. I ordered a plated salad after it was explained to me that a plated salad is salad on a plate. I had an image of latticed and braided vegetables Read the Rest…
January 6, 2020
Wendy drove as fast as she would allow herself to get to the Botallack mine by sunset. The evening was cold and the wind never stops blowing in from the Atlantic. Yet quite a large group had gathered. A young woman sat cross-legged on a rock that jutted into the sea and waited. Others waited Read the Rest…
November 18, 2019
Welcome to Port Wenn! If you are a fan of the series Doc Martin, you’ll appreciate the reference. If you aren’t, read on. We went other places, too. The day began at the cottage in Morvah with the usual tea and breakfast and me asking Sue and Wendy what they remembered from the day before Read the Rest…
November 3, 2019
Monday morning–my first sugarless day– I was awakened by the sound of birds singing and cows moo-ing: Since I was still the only one up, I went round the cottage filming the window fixtures and talking to myself: When I finished this catalog of domestic quotidian, I took off my glasses to polish a lens Read the Rest…
October 27, 2019
Sunday was my day of reckoning for all the cake in my system. In the morning we drove into St Ives, Wendy parked in the car park and we rode the shuttle bus into the heart of town. The car park/shuttle is really the only solution for these villages with narrow streets never meant for Read the Rest…