Rain and Pheasants

After being in England for a month it is time for a catch up. First up was a trip down to Cornwall to stay with my sister Gail and brother-in-law Janos near Lostwithiel. Having not won a lottery recently we looked into alternatives to rail travel. The only other option is a National Express bus which does work out quite a bit cheaper, if you don’t mind sitting for 5.5 hours on a motorway.  For some reason it is substantially cheaper to get a local bus to an out-of-the-way shopping centre to board the Express rather  than take it directly from the local railway/bus depot in the centre of town.

Staying in Cornwall may not have been that timely given the continuous storms that have been battering the coast for weeks. Luckily Cornwall is relatively hilly so it isn’t submerged like Somerset.  But it does have numerous seaside towns and these have been taking a hammering. Some of the better videos are here. We certainly found that most days were wet and windy.

On the good days – of which there were a few – we were taken out to visit some typical Cornish sites:

·       The Eden Project: an amazing site and home of the world’s largest indoor tropical rainforest! A great place to be on a cold and wet winter’s day.

Neolithic and historic remains. There are numerous standing stones, Celtic crosses and remains of settlements dotted around the countryside.

Up on Bodmin Moor: peaceful (if you excuse the wind) and very atmospheric. Beautiful rock formations, shaggy sheep, wild horses and Highland cattle.

Several nice seaside cafes including Rick Stein’s Café (not to be confused with Rick Stein’s Restaurant or Rick Stein’s Delicatessen)

The wide sandy beach at Rock, opposite Padstow. It could easily have been NZ except for the sheer number of people out walking dogs.

Could be NZ!

One of our highlights was taking part in a pheasant shoot here at the estate where Gail and Janos live and work. It was the last of the season and called the “Beaters’ Shoot” where roles are reversed: those who have been beaters get to shoot and v.v. Much more relaxed than normal as the “guns” weren’t paying big money to be there and under pressure to bag some birds. Our day started at 9am Cornish time, i.e. 10am, when we met the guns, fetchers (with dogs) and other beaters )(some with dogs) at the Shooting Lodge in the woods on the property. The estate was divided into several sections which were to be tackled one at a time. We headed off with the other beaters in old 4WDs to the first section, lined up, and then walked slowly banging our walking sticks trying to scare the pheasants up into the air. Every once in a while we would be startled when one made a dash out of hiding (it is easy to walk right past one and not see it). Someone would yell out so a shooter could have a go.

The woods are quite steep in places and very muddy and slippery with all the rain. Vicki ended up with a big bruise on her tailbone, I just got covered in mud. Luckily the dogs do most of the work running around so it is pretty easy as long as you don’t have to stand around too long as you can get very cold and wet. Once our first section was over we regrouped at the Lodge for a glass of port before tackling the next section. Lunch was then had – hot pasties from a local bakery and cakes, plus lots more port – then back into a couple more beats before finishing mid-afternoon. Very civilised. I think that 20-odd pheasants were taken though it seems more about the shooting than the pheasants. We had already had several meals of pheasant by this time and there was a lot left, some would be going out as fox food shortly.

We intended to head back to Petersfield (due south of London) to see our friends Tim and Linda. Initially we though to take the bus for cheapness, but it was to be 11.5 hours! Going in and out of London is easy, but cross-country routes aren’t. So we booked the train, only to find that a section of railway in Devon had been washed away so we were on a bus for part of the trip anyway. All train travel in the west country has been badly affected so there are many delays and cancellations. Not a big problem for us as we don’t have many time constraints. All the streams we passed were overflowing and so much of the countryside was under water.

We're now settled into a house and pet-sit in Reading for two to four months.  The house has been sold and the owner has had her offer on a new place in Weybridge accepted, so we expect we'll be moving there in a couple of months.

Postscript:

Winds brought down over 20 big trees on the estate in Cornwall. Luckily no one was out at the time. The only casualty was the Shooting Lodge which got hit by a couple of trees.

Proof that aliens were here in 1741 ... hmmm...