First, the Old Coastguard
Last summer in Cornwall
We went to Cornwall at the end of August 2023, a shameless return to the same places we’d been four years earlier. Same train ride to Penzance. Same route from the station to the fishing village of Mousehole. We’d dreamed of the UK’s southwest during long pandemic years—forbidden and out of reach. We set all our lock screens to pictures from the first trip, named our dog Penny after the Penwith Peninsula, and imagined the coastal paths when we could not sleep.
One.
It’s the hour before dinner and we are here, at last. Already, I’ve been in the sea. We walked down to the rock pool just to look at it, and then I had to put my feet in. It is so clear, smooth black rocks on the bottom, tiny barnacles, orange feathery seaweed. The pool is small and square, a few meters across, obviously made by humans, built into the edge of the coast. There were children with nets, padding along its walls, looking for things to catch. There were people sitting on the shore nearby with their dogs. Then, three women were going for a plunge, and it only took a little bit of encouragement from Chris for me to climb up the hill to our hotel, and all the stairs inside to our room, and change into my swimsuit.
The water was bracing but welcoming. It melted away the day-long train journey in an instant.
This inn was closed when we were last in Mousehole, we stayed in a rental a few streets away. I’d seen pictures of its seaside garden, with waving rainbow pennants and palms, its faded two-toned hydrangeas, and its view of St. Clement’s Isle and Mount Bay. Funny how you think you know a place because of pictures. These glimpses through social media are deceiving. To actually be here is different. And to immerse in the cold and transparent Cornish seawater was better than I had imagined.
Two.
It’s rare to have this kind of access to the horizon, except when I am at sea. The whole inn is oriented towards the bay. Last night we sat on our room’s balcony with a pot of lemon tea and looked out at boats blinking on the water, the lights in the garden below. We listened to distant dogs barking, the lap of waves against the coast, birds calling, the crunch of footsteps. The wind puffed gently on our faces. The night was cool. All we could smell was kitchen grease, blowing from a nearby vent. But we’re staying at an inn with a wonderful kitchen, after all.
Three.
We went to 2 Fore Street for dinner and started with just-caught sardine filets with capers and pesto. Chris had a giant bowl of moules frites and I had fish curry with shrimp, mussels, white fish, and rice.
“You had that last time,” Chris started to say.
“You can’t say that when last time was four years ago.”
I’ve been telling myself this in our journey of revisiting.
After dinner last night we ran the bath. Our room at the Old Coastguard is at the very top of four flights of stairs. It’s long and linear with a bathroom at the far end, the bed in a nook, a balcony, and a tub surrounded by windows that face the village and the bay. The tub’s cold water tap is broken, something they told us when we arrived, so Chris filled it with scalding water and then spent the next twenty minutes walking back and forth from the bathroom with small pitchers of cold water. After a while I went down to the kitchen and asked for ice. This helped minimally. Eventually it cooled. We turned out the lights in the alcove, and I got in little by little, until I was immersed After all that, it was still too hot and I only stayed in for a few minutes.
After the bath I finished reading Our Wives Under the Sea which seemed a sinister pairing. It is a mysterious and tender book—paced immaculately—untidy in a way that made its realism shine out. Imperfect, earnest humans in perplexing circumstances. At the end I felt deep loss. And yet the whole book had prepared me for that loss—or release—into the sea.
Four.
Things I ate (and drank) today
At the Old Coastguard
Homemade yogurt with lemon curd
Gluten-free toast with marmalade
Poached eggs
West County bacon
Black tea
From the Rockpool Cafe, but eaten at Marazion Beach before ascending St. Michael’s Mount
Small buttered Newlyn crab sandwiches
Fresh apricots
Crisps
On St. Michael’s Mount
Chicken, bacon, mayo sandwich from the cafe
Strawberry and clotted cream ice cream made by Moomaid of Zennor
At Mackerel Sky Seafood Bar
Mackerel with pickles and horseradish
Scallops with chorizo and pukka
New potatoes
Lemon posset
G&T
In Lovett’s Wine Bar
Stolen sips of Chris’s orange wine
On the balcony, before bed
Chamomile tea
Five.
The sun terrace is just a few steps down from the low-lit dining room. Floor to ceiling windows look out to sea. Sofas and wingback chairs in soft fabrics form sitting areas, divided by bookcases. Drum lamps made from thin strips of bent wood hang from the ceiling. Chris is taken by the blue beadboard and yellow wall paint. There are long linen curtains between each set of windows, gathered by thick white rope.
It’s been overcast each morning, the day emerging gently with diffuse light on a misty horizon. This morning there is mist everywhere, but the sun is still managing to flare and sparkle on the water, insistently. Chris is trying to sleep on this sofa. I am writing.
Six.
I have gone over this walk to Lamorna Cove so many times, looked back over our pictures, regarded the day we walked here on our last trip as one of the happiest of my life. So we’re here again. Almost to the pub at the cove. We have been tramping since noon. Never pushing our pace. Stopping to look, to take pictures, to slowly navigate deep, black mud. The fields are fragrant after rain. There are wild blackberries tumbling from hedgerows, and piles of apples falling out of overgrown orchards. The cove faces today’s wind and I am listening to the churning of the water on rock. All these cubic rocks, piled up along this coast, dark with seawater, softened by moss, bleached like bone. What is it about this winding, narrow stretch of footpath that moves me so deeply? I took out my notebook so I could write about everything in sight: the ferns burnt to orange-red, the Queen Anne’s Lace gone to brown seed, tiny purple and white flowers that look like orchids, orange mountain dandelion. And then the scent of dried grass and salt air, wet earth and unknown herbs crushed by my boots. The flowing, breathing, sound of the wind. The sea moving in great endlessness. A patch of blue on the horizon.
Seven.
Last morning at the Old Coastguard. Chris was up earlier than I wanted to be and eager to pack. I begged him to wait until later, which he openly found annoying and continued. I put on my sleep mask and slept on. Then, out onto the balcony where the sun was flashing on Mount Bay, St. Clement’s Isle was a black hole of negative space, and down in the harbor I could see white-haired women bobbling within the quay at high tide. I went down too. There are steel ladders on the sea wall to get in and out. I climbed down and sank into the water. It’s perfect, when the water is high 50s, low 60s. Just cold enough to make all the parts of your body tingle, not cold enough to be painful. It still requires some care: not staying in too long and changing right away. I had a short soak in the harbor and breaststroked out into the bay to have a final look. Then I went back inside for breakfast.
Next Sea Diary: The Gurnard’s Head