Here is another gorgeous doorway from St Ives. Once again I am using a door as a way of introducing a topic that would only provide very poor visual content. The gate is open which is a fine excuse to open up about my latest addiction. Like many addictions someone introduced me to this new pleasure. It was almost a throw away comment as he left the house.
There is nothing more exciting for our dogs than a beach that is slightly damp and yielding to the paws. A beach where they can build up speed and go a little crazy without human intervention. January is the perfect month for such adventures. This picture was taken at the very end of a long walk, the dog footprints are there just for the joy. The human footprints have determination and purpose. The human footprints are heading towards coffee and cake in a favourite cafe.
The cafe was closed for refurbishments. The dogs continued with joy and the humans made compromises. Ultimately everyone was happy.
Which is more than can be said for any lobster who casually wanders into a lobster pot looking for a snack.
A late ponder and a strange one too. I’m not yet done with St Ives but this ponder witnessed the great divide in our country yesterday. The door was on a street in St Ives and for the purposes of this ponder represents home, somewhere safe to live. Yesterday we witnessed a street cleaner very gently clearing the debris around a homeless woman, there was a lot of stuff and the whole time he was brushing and picking up litter he carried on an entirely upbeat conversation, as if they had just met. He exuded kindness and I felt awkward for just walking past, but in awe of the way he was handling a difficult situation. The interaction stuck with me. Just a couple of hours later we were walking near our home, there was a boat show in our local harbour.
These two moments are at either end of the financial scale of this countries wealth, its all a little mind blowing. The kindly street cleaner is the high point of the day, however pretty these boats look.
Morning has broken in St Ives with the gorgeous colour of Cadbury Chocolate wrappers.
In truth not the most thrilling of sunrises but the clear sky was a sign that the day was going to be a bit of a colour sensation. Early morning duties were the pleasure of sharing the start of our day with Miss VV, our granddaughter in Hong Kong. Our early morning adventures with her via video call involved stories involving sand horses and naughty seagulls. For the rest of our day we had strict instructions on the photographs that needed to be taken to be sent to her for when she wakes up. Seagulls were top of her list.
This one is a bit of a visual joke as he had managed to poo on the reflection of his own head.
Another request was dogs on their holidays.
Miss VV did not request a piece of Barbara Hepworth sculpture but we took our own initiative and took one anyway.
Gifted in 1965 to the town she had adopted as her home.
We did a three hour coastal path walk and found some small and deeply personal sculptures. Love locks attached to a small metal fence on the sea side of the path. Stuck together and corroded by the salt spray of the Atlantic.
The thing we didn’t manage to capture was a dolphin feeding frenzy which we witnessed but luckily for the blog a more proficient photographer was about earlier in the week.
Yesterday did not go as planned. But I knew the best laid plans had failed by 6pm the night before so a different plan was hatched. Serendipity stepped up to take the place of forward planning and for the first time in just over two years we got a seat in our favourite and now local coffee shop, so the birthday fairies were not totally having a bad day. First World problems and all that but it was lovely to have coffee in a cup sat at a table indoors. The surprise element of the birthday outing still happened but not in the way it was meant to be. A pair of pyjamas in a carrier bag does not have the same impact as pyjamas served in a biscuit tin which depicts the destination of the next couple of days. The irony is not lost on me that 6 months ago we moved out of a Cornish cottage and yet I had booked our first break away in a Cornish cottage. To be fair to me my search area for a cottage was anywhere between Penzance and Bristol. I had four search parameters.
1- Price
2- Dog friendly
3- Plenty of walking with no need to use the car for three days
4-A homely cottage, not cute and absolutely not decorated in blue and white, with beach huts, seagulls or fish as decorative features.
Number 4 turned out to be the deciding factor.
When we moved from a non touristy part of Cornwall to a very touristy part of Devon we moved our decorative fish with us but beyond that one detail we prefer a more organic style of interior design. Stuff gleaned from ebay, skips or dumpster, charity shops or friends and neighbours discarded or unneeded items.
After a sunshine filled hour or two in Truro, we took the road to St Ives.
Truro Cathedral
We arrived after dark and just like short stay tourists everywhere we trundled our little suitcases the ten minute walk from a car park to our destination.
Comfy cottage.
More irony as we settled down with a cup of tea. A programme about Cornwall was on the TV as we settled in.
We did not eat spider crab last night, but fish and chips and sausages for dogs filled us up ready for today’s walking.
We are off on a little adventure today. Not words that have been used very often over the last two years. The weather has been checked and a booking made but beyond that nothing has been done in preparation, because the adventure is a surprise for everyone else @theoldmortuary. Which makes this a very brief blog.
Thankfully a friends new Podcast was released yesterday which gives me something to share with you.
Blogging was a lot like these little boats today. Left behind by the tide of my own technical inadequacies. I had failed to charge my laptop and then plugged it in to a socket that wasn’t turned on. Zoom meetings had to be attended on my phone. Irritating as this was it was enlivened by WhatsApp messages from friends.
One friend was moving his hot tub to his new home. It looked like more fun than I was having.
However much I yearn for in- person meetings. It would be rude to get my phone out so this newly learned meeting brightener will be shortlived but I may now default to my phone for Zoom meeting’s just for the onscreen entertainment.
But the joy when I got out of my second Zoom meeting of the day was palpable. Maybe the dogs will prefer it when I no longer Zoom at home.
Blue Monday began by delivering stuff to a charity shop, accidentally as can so easily happen, something was also bought. This time a tiny pill box.
It is the exact same pattern as a powder compact I received as a bridesmaids gift when I was 12. It was a lovely jolt of recognition and nostalgia. Something that happens rarely in my life as I no longer have any living relatives who knew me as a child or teenager. Obviously a trip to deliver stuff to a charity shop is not a reason to buy more stuff but this little pot will be useful for travelling earrings. We had coffee and a croissant overlooking the symbolic Mayflower Steps and harvested more Vitamin D while taking in all the positive blueness of the day. The Bakery we bought the croissants from predates the sailing of the Mayflower by almost 100 years, that is a lot of years to perfect baking skills.
Defiantly red on the 3rd Monday of January. Traditionally the Blue Monday of the Northern hemisphere. Maybe it should be the Blue, blue Monday as the world marks nearly two years of Covid restrictions. We are all a little tatty round the edges regardless of the day. Maybe Blue Monday has lost its bite in the pandemic as life has progressed so long with a slightly blue tinge.
Bucking the blue trend as well was Miss Spearmint who is very assertively making sure the local beach is closed for the day by resting on the steps. Yet enhancing the day by spreading out her tail flipper to show off her lovely pink webs.
#100 a late blog, not for complicated reasons. More weather related, we woke up to sunshine this morning and just felt the need to walk in sunshine and harvest Vitamin D while it was still an option.
The bright sunlight did provide some lovely complicated images though.
Fennel seed heads, shadows and repaired, cracked masonry.
Our walk just took in really familar territory at a ponderous speed and lots of basking in pools of daylight.
Cast iron railings, shadows and masonry
Nearly four hours of walking required two stops for coffee, and of course a wee.
Complicated shadows and textures outside a loo.
We were not the only ones having a bask. Miss Spearmint was also making the most of the sunshine.
As were the Cormorants.
And then just like that nature turned the lights off …
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