St Neot

Sunday was the best day for walking for a long time: bright and sunny, although not too hot and it was the first time this year that we felt able to wear shorts!

We began at the car park near Golitha Falls and followed narrow country lanes to reach the village of St Neot just over an hout later. The church stands alongside the busy London Inn - once an important staging post for the coaches (horse drawn, of course) to and from London. Inside the church, the famous stained glass windows are immediately apparent and most impressive.

Outside, a dead branch can be seen hanging over the top of the tower. This is replaced every May in a commemoration of the Civil War when this village remained loyal to the King.

After lunch in the churchyard, we continued along the partly way marked Two Valleys Walk. After some further lanes we struck out across open moorland for much of the remainder of our walk, leaving the way marked walk perhaps an hour later. One stretc h we had to navigate from the map as indications on the ground were scant, but we arrived at the road through the valley from Jaimaica Inn on target.

A unexpected tea room faced us as we reached the road - a temptation that could not be passed by! It was very pleasant indeed, sitting in the riversode garden, soaking up the sunshine so that we stayed rather longer than we should!

Off again and the next landmark was Siblyback Lake, a reservoir, where we passed the foot of the dam before climbing up to a footpath at the the level of the top of the dam. The reservoir, after all the rainfall, was at least full - unusual for this time of the year!

From there is was back across to the lake's access road - a route that took us along an old road/track, rather over grown but with the thickest swarm of midges we have ever seen (even in Scotland). Finally, back to the car park along futher footpaths. Only one church this week.

Duloe, St Keyne and Herodsfoot

After a long break whilst we undertook our canal journey, we resumed our tour of Cornish churches on Sunday, beginning in the West Looe valley, near Pelynt. After walking down part of the valley we struck off, following an old 'road' steeply uphill to emerge eventually close to Duloe church, which is about half a mile from the village centre.

We walked into the main part of the village - it still has a Post Office and village shop - before finding a bench in the small recreation area to sit and eat our lunch. Aftwerwards we took a look at the Stone Circle. Although this is belived to be of ancient origin, comparable with those at other Cornish places such as the Minions, it was only re-discovered a few decades ago, by which time the stones had fallen over and were covered by a large field boundary wall. They have been restored to what are believed to be their original positions, marking the eight main compass points.

On then across country to Causeland in the East Looe River valley, having come steeply down hill through a newish woodland - at least it is not entirely marked on our OS map! We followed the valley alongside the branch line for a short distance before climbing up towards the main village of St Keyne (its station lies down in the valley alongside Paul Corin's Magnificient Music Machines, a museum dedicated to old organs and other mechanical musical instruments.

About a third of a mile before the village we came to the ancient St Keyne Well, with a legend dating back to the seventh century CE. Started by a princess (at thew time, Cornwall had a pol;uation of but a few thoiusand and was ruled by several 'kings') who declared that following a marriage, whichever of the couple first drank water from the well would rule the household. This led to a traditional extra to weddings held in the village church: as soon as the couple were married they raced down to the well to drink from it. Needless to say, the man almost always won the race. Until, that is, on one occasion when the newly wed husband dashed off as usual but soon realised that his bride was not following, Turning round, he saw her sitting on the church step, drinking water from abottle which she had filled from the well!

The church itself was closed - the parish forms part of the Liskeard benefice and seemed rather downbeat. Most of the members of its electoral roll come from outside the parish!

Our route then followed a narrow country lane, eventually very steep down into the tiny hamlet of Herodsfoot. The church here was built in 1850 to serve the rapidly growing population based on the local mine and gunpowder factory. The population of the parish is now only 160 Although the church is in a pretty poor state, there is obviously an ambitious programme of restoration with a new slated roof in 2005. Internally it will take a lot of imaginative work to make it really useful.

Finally, we followed the West Looe River valley back to our starting point. Despite the weather forecast, this had been one of the few parts of Cornwall that was dry all afternoon.