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.

Yestreday, we began at Treverbyn, parking in a convenient lay-by just a few metres from the church. Although the church was
locked (in common with most in this area it seems - in contrast to other parts of the county) the gravestones
suggested that it was built in the 1840's - no doubt to support the growing industrial population of the nearby
china clay workings. The churchyard itself is only a short distance from one of the former clay quarries.

Our route followed a number of very attractive footpaths - many appeared to be old roads as they had good banks or
walls on either side. Occasionally we emerged from the footpaths, perhaps to cross a road, when it was surprising
to see just how close we were to the clay workings.
On just one of these we found a grassy bank beside the track to sit for our lunch - with a splendid view of
Goonbarrow in the distance!
There is, at times, such a network of official and unofficial paths that it is easy to take the wrong one - or at
least that is our excuse for ending up under the road bridge at Bugle, before back-traking about half a mile to go
where we wanted!
After a short walk along the road between Roche and Bugle - passing a splendid recent conversion of a former china
clay drier works into B&B accommodation - we took to an overgrown footpath. Before long it was almost choked with
untreated Japanese Knotweed - alas we could do little but struiggle through it and hope that we did not spread it
any further - but soon meregd onto a track (which we could have taken from the road it later transpired!)

This brought us to the foot of Roche Rocks with its old hermit's chapel or folly perched on the top. (A ladder up
the face of the rock gives the more intrepid visitor a marvellsous view from the top!) Soon after we arrived at
Roche. Again, the church was, alas, closed.

Unfortunately, Christine's foot was complaining - exacerbated by standing for long periods at the Royal Cornwall
Show the day before but we spotted a bus timetimable. Just for once it was a route that operates on Sunday - every
two hours - and just happened to go right past where we had parked. Discretion seemed the wisest move and so,
following a pleasant sit in the churchyard, we boarded the otherwise unused bus. The driver's takings were not
enahnced as we managed to find our rarely-used bus passes and trvaelled without further payment!

Yesterday was generally very low cloud - at sea level it was dry but as soon as our route took us up to the base of the cloud, it was rather damp. However, it never became so wet that we needed to take our waterproofs out of the rucksack.

We began at Par, with the chapel-of-ease called the Church of the Good Shepherd, in the main part of Par, close to the railway lines and china clay works.

The rail track from Par Docks runs inland and quickly joins the branch line to Newquay. A good footpath follows the route and that of a small river and, we think, the remains of the canal once built to the foot of the incline from the Treffrey Viaduct tram network. As the path crossed the track at one point, our predictions about a train being unlikely as two had alr4eady passed in the past 15 minutes (it is not exactly the busiest of routes) we spotted a Virgin train making its way slowly down to Par at about 20 mph - or less!

The path emerged at Tywardreath Highway and from there it was a short walk to St Blazey Church. From there we walked uphill and around to Par church. Although from the main road this feels as if it is at the top of a hill, it is actually art way down - as you soon discover when approaching it on foot. Thye cloud base was sufficiently low to leave the top of the steeple very unclear!

After eating our lunch in the hcurchyard, we continued through Tregrehan Mills and then up a hill to cross the newish Distributor Road before arriving at Boscoppa on the outskirts of St Austell. The church here meets in Bishop Bronscombe Church of England primary school.

It was downhill, through Bethel, almost all the way to Charlestown - this is one of the main Forward in Faith bases in Cornwall. It is set a little back from the harbour, once important for the export of china clay but now more popular with visitors as a base for a small fleet of sailing ships, wich appear in many films and television dramas.

After a plesant cup of tea and teacake, the last part of the walk followed the coastal path, through Carlyon Bay (why cannot the planners allow the development to continue? Wrecking objections from local residents serve only to leave this beach little better than a disaster area whilst official inquiries continue)

Fowey and Tywardreath

We walked on Saturday this week as I am going to Torpoint this evening to sing Evensong with the Washaway West Gallery Choir. As it happened, yesterday was also foreast to be the better weather - despite this there was a little drizzle in the air as we parked at Par Beach and set off along a coastal stretch of the Saints Way to Polkerris. Dropping down into the harbour, we found a cafe for a late morning coffee.





Afterwards, we walked back up a wooded valley to the spinal road, emerging close to Tregaminion, a chapel-of-ease belonging to Tywardreath parish and originally founded by William Rashleigh in memory of his wife.


Still following the Saints Way we arrived at Readymoney beach - ready for our lunch. We found some seats (which Christine recalled from the last time walked the Saints Way about three years ago! or it might have been when doing the coastal path, only two years ago) As we sat with a good view of the mnay yachts in the river mouth, a china clay ship left port, escorted by the pilot boat.





We continued through the town, calling at the church of Finbarrus before passing the Bodinnick ferry landing and then inland, still following the waymarked Saints Way, until we arrived at the isolated village of Golant.





The railway line, still used to carry china clay to Fowey, separates the village from the river. The church is up a very steep hill from the centre of the village.





Now, it was a straightforward run to Tywardreath, once at the top of the hill at Castledore it was a good downhill. The House on the Strand is the interpretation of the name, reflecting the fact that once boats could come upriver to the village, but no longer. Although rather a backwater today, this was formerly quite an important place, shown by the substantial size of the church.

From here it was not far, although up and down a sharp hill, back to Par beach where, alas, the cafe had already closed!

Lanteglos-by-Camelford

This is one of the churches we visited before setting up the blog. I am adding it at this time as a test of Blogging directly from Picasa

Lansallos and Lanteglos-By-Fowey

This week's walk was shortened as a result of having Andrew as a visitor for the weekend and there was a priority on fixing the communications facilities for the upcoming canal journey! On the other hand, his speed of walking led us to a longer distance in the time than might have been the case left to ourselves!

Having parked at the National Trust car park not far from Pont, we wlked along lanes and across fields to Lansallos church. This building is still undergoing restoration following an arson attack. The roof now appears to be complete (about half of it had to be fully replaced) but the rest of the inside is still a working site! Meanwhile, services are held in the adjoining Sunday School.

Next, we walked the short distance down to the coastline and continued in the westerley direction, stopping shortly afterwards for our lunch picnic.

This is a very beautiful stretch of coast, but you are always either steeply ascending or steeply descending. There is little time on the level to recover!

With time catching up on us we headed back across a three fields to the spinal road that leads to Polruan, but took the narrow lane to Lanteglos church. (Known in slightly wider circles as Lanteglos-By-Fowey to avoid confusion with the Lanteglos near Camelford)

From there is was a simple task to follow the old track down to the road near Pont and back along the road to the car park.

Lanlivery and Luxulyan

Today's walk included the two 'clay' parishes of Lanlivey and Luxulyan - although Lanlivery aligns more to Lostwithiel and the clay towns of St Blazey and St Austell.

We parked in the Luxulyan Valley, close to the Treffrey Viaduct and walked for about an hour to Lanlivery - mostly uphill. However, it was perfect walking weather: sunny with a slight breeze and enough haze to take the burning quality out of the sun - although this did mean the longer views were not as good as they might have been.

Spurning the opportunity for a drink at the pub (which Christine knew from a recent visit for lunch with a friend) we continued to Luxulyan where, after a look inside the church, we sat on one of the benches outside for lunch. (The pub turned out to be a little distance from the church - odd in many ways but it is alonside the small station on the Newquay branch line)

In fact, by the time we had had our lunch and then walked down to the pub Christine no longer fancied a drink of cider preferring instead to aim for tea at the Eden project.

After a short distance along a side road we saw a sign for the new(ish) Clay Trail - suitable for horses, cycles and walkers. Signpost suggested about 1.75 miles - although this turned out to be to the entrance to the long drive to the Visitor Centre. The trail took us through an area once a clay pit but which finished extracting china clay in 1971 and has now been landscaped for community use.

Once we arrived at the entrance to the Eden Project, the path for walkers and cyclists (not pushbikes as Christine told me off for saying!) the first sign said that it was another mile to the Visitor Centre!

Eventually we arrived and settled down to a welcome cup of tea (or in my case two cups) plus a small slice of cake. Refreshed we set off back up the hill to continue along the route of the Cornish Way No3 (cycle route) and then down to Tywardreath Highway, where to Newquay Branch Line sets off up the Luxulyan Valley.

Therw had been an indication on the Cornwall County Council rights of way map that there was a footpath (with no right of way) alongside the railway line and indeed we were able to locate it and walk up to Ponts Mill without having to take the longer route along the A road. The railway line followed the route of both a canal and a tramway that Treffrey built (at different stages) as part of his amazing complex network of leats, tramways and other haulage routes, maily to access granite from neat Luxulyan.

After climbing most of the steeply sloping former tram route (still marked with the granite sleepers) we struck off along a lower path, pleasantly level which eventually broght us back to the car park, shortly after passing under the huge Treffrey Viaduct (which was built both as an aqueduct (which still is) and a tranway.