St. Ives to Portreath

Rain, rain and more rain! Woke to a murky looking day, but that did not deter our intrepid walker. Still in shorts but with a waterproof coat he set off quite early again, leaving me with a van and no diesel.

There were periods of pretty heavy rain all morning, but he was quite cheerful when we met at about 2.15 pm as by that time there were brighter patches. I had spent a lovely morning reading Saturday's paper and catching up on all the wedding gossip. I then walked to Navrax Point and saw The Lighthouse of Virginia Woolf fame.

Crane Castle

Drove on to Portreath to wait for the walker and to find food for tea. It's an attractive place with a harbour and a small beach where lots of surfers were braving the wind and rain to ride the waves. We also saw some brave souls jumping off the harbour wall into stormy seas!

Hell's Mouth

From Bernie:

• today's walk 17.3 miles : Cumulative 40.8 miles (wasn't sure the old knees could cope with 17 miles - longest walk for 12 months!)
• highlight was meeting a YH warden from Skipton, walking the South-West Coast path - we chatted about long-distance walks & he told me about a couple who'd stayed at his YH a couple of weeks ago: they were walking LeJog & had been going for five & a half weeks
• without a day off!
• a close second to this was the superb hot pasty I bought from Philp's Bakery in Hayle.... suddenly the rain wasn't a problem!
• beer of the day was 'Black Prince', a dark St. Austell's ale from the unusually named 'Bucket of Blood' pub in Phillack - good beer

A wet Portreath!