Cornwall: Magnificent Mevagissey

I know it’s no longer fashionable to use alliteration when composing a title for a blog / article / whatever but I couldn’t help myself. Mevagissey is another of Cornwall’s magical, captivating, picturesque, charming and quaint old fishing villages, and it really was magnificent.

Mevagissey is named after two saints, St Meva (or Mevan) and St Issey, who were, apparently, Irish saints who brought Christianity to the tribes of Cornwall, but human occupation in this place goes back much further. Bronze age arrows have been found locally, and the Romans had a camp, named Colonia, at nearby Chapel Point.

The traditional industry is, of course, fishing, with large quantities of sardines and pilchards appearing in regular seasonal shoals along much of this coast. Several of the historic buildings around the walled harbour relate to the fishing industry, and would have housed barrel makers, sail makers and boat repairers, as well as net lofts and basket weavers. According to a sign in the village, in its heyday the pilchard fishermen landed between 12 and 15 thousand tonnes per annum – that’s a lot of fish! At that time, there were up to 30 large fishing boats operating out of Mevagissey but nowadays both the number and size of the vessels are much smaller.

The sign also explained why the narrow streets of Cornish fishing villages like Mevagissey meander circuitously around the harbour, rather than being in any kind of grid pattern. In the 18th century Mevagissey was notorious for being a smugglers’ lair, with brandy, gin, tea, silks and fine lace, as well as tobacco, all passing quietly through, and the suggestion is that the town’s streets were deliberately ‘designed to impede the efforts of the enforcement officers’. Sneaky!

We meandered with the streets, walked up the hill for a panoramic view, walked out along both sides of the enclosing harbour walls, had the obligatory Cornish pasties for our lunch (backs to the wall again so as to deter the gull pasty thieves), and mooched around the gifty shops (still hunting for that elusive present for our cottage owners – great excuse, eh?). It was all simply splendid!

I’ll round off our visit with a couple of pub signs. The 16th-century Ship Inn sports a glorious sailing ship and it has a fabulous story of a resident ghost, a former landlady who protects the inn from flooding. And the Fountain Inn is even older – the building dates from the 15th century, though wasn’t always a pub. The interior still contains evidence of its use for pilchard processing in the 18th and 19th centuries. We visited neither of these places but both definitely sound like they’re worth a visit ... or six! Obviously, I’ll need to go back one day.

Cornwall: Mummers Day in Stein-ville

Padstow is one of the most picturesque fishing villages I’ve ever seen, a delight of old buildings and a charm of meandering lanes clustered around a small walled harbour basin, this day full of colourful fishing boats. I make no apology for including lots of photos!

For those who don’t know, my rather tongue-in-cheek naming of the town as Stein-ville in this post’s title is a reference partly to the fame – and tourist dollars – that have come to Padstow as a result of celebrity chef Rick Stein and wife Jill buying a nightclub-then-restaurant way back in 1974, and partly because he seems to own half the town!

Nowadays, according to Rickstein.com, you can ‘stay in our 40 guest rooms in Padstow’ or ‘visit our deli, gift shop, patisserie and fishmongers in Padstow’ and you have a varied choice of Rick Stein places to eat, from the flagship Seafood Restaurant to Rick Stein’s Cafe, Stein’s Fish and Chips, and St Petroc’s Bistro. Plus, you can learn to cook the Rick Stein way at Rick Stein’s Cookery School. I’m amazed Padstow hasn’t voted Rick Stein for mayor! Oh, and in case you’re wondering whether or not we tried his produce, all the Stein outlets were closed.    

That's because it was Boxing Day and, also because it was Boxing Day, the streets were jam-packed with tourists and holidaymakers but not so many as to be unpleasant – there was a jolly buzz to the atmosphere, and one major contribution to this buzz came from the mummers. We were enjoying the obligatory Cornish pasty lunch in a local cafe when we saw our first sign of them – a young woman with blackened face – followed soon after by a young man, also with blackened face and wearing a colourful waistcoat, who came to draw money from the cash machine across the road.

As we emerged from the cafe and headed towards the harbour, we heard first the drumming, then the piano accordions. People were gathering – there was a parade! Everyone loves a parade!

Here’s the background from the Cornwall Guide website:   

Every year on Boxing Day and New Year's Day the townsfolk take to the streets once more for their corresponding winter festival, traditionally known as Darkie Days.
Darkie Days form part of an ancient tradition of Pagan midwinter festivals that were until quite recently celebrated all over Cornwall between Christmas Day and Twelfth Night. The festivals centred on the practice of guise dancing (also known as goose dancing), which usually involved the performance of a traditional play (known as a Mummer's or Mumming play) whilst wearing a disguise, traditionally a blackened face, which allowed the players to lose their inhibitions and perform outlandishly in return for food or money. The practice of blacking one's face signalled a contrast to the summer festivals, such as the Obby Oss, during which white would be worn to herald the spring.

Due to the current fashion for political correctness, the name Darkie Day has been deemed inappropriate and the days are now known as Mummers Days. The face painting has also been criticised but, as explained above, this has absolutely nothing to do with race. Personally, I love the fact that local people are keeping these wonderful old traditions alive!

The parade was fun to watch – we saw them pass by twice during our wanders around the town, so I got lots of photos and made sure to add a donation to their collection boxes (in aid of local charities). Except for missing out on Rick Stein's fish and chips, we had timed our visit to Padstow just perfectly!

Cornwall: St Ives

Christmas Eve saw us out and about for our second day exploring charming Cornwall. Disappointingly, Poldark Mine was closed but St Michael’s Mount was looking magical as we parked and set off for an hour’s stroll along Marazion Beach and back. Not only were the kiteboarders enjoying the stiff sea breezes but thousands of gulls were also on the wing above the waves. (For more on what caused that phenomenon, see here.)

Next stop, St Ives. We parked the car in a carpark high on the hill above the town, which was perfect for panoramic views but took a bit of effort climbing back up again later in the day. The weather was bright and sunny, and the town was crowded with holidaymakers and last-minute Christmas shoppers but it didn’t feel too packed, just had a pleasant holiday buzz to the atmosphere.

There were plenty of narrow winding streets lined with interesting shops and galleries to explore, as well as the ubiquitous bakeries selling world-famous Cornish pasties in all manner of ingredient combinations.

After some time spent mooching around the galleries, we decided to buy pasties and find a seat somewhere around the harbour to eat. Our pasties came with a warning, however: ‘The gulls here are vicious. One will distract you while the others swoop down from behind, so be careful where you sit and, whatever you do, don’t feed them!’ Forewarned is fore-armed, as they say, so we found a bench with our backs to a building wall and weren’t bothered at all by the scavenging gulls ... though I’m sure the scouts on the rooftops were watching our every mouthful!

Lunch polished off, we walked further, round the harbour, to the little lighthouse at the end of the harbour wall, along alleyways, up and down lanes. Eventually, our legs grew weary and we still had that hill to face so off we set.

Rather than drive the main highway home, we headed north through Hayle and then along the coastal road. 

The scenery was spectacular and, when we saw a sign for Deadman’s Cove, we couldn’t resist stopping for a gander and enjoyed a bit of a wander along part of the coastal path, though not too close to the crumbly edges. 

It was the perfect way to polish off another magnificent day in magical Cornwall.

Cornwall: St Mawes and Porthscatho

What an intriguing place St Mawes was!

Storm Barbara was making her presence felt with squally showers, waves breaking over the sea wall, and gusty winds, so, after enjoying lunch in a cosy cafe on the waterfront, we didn’t venture far ... up and down the narrow old lanes, along back alleys, back along the seafront, out on to the harbour wall, briefly. It was a picturesque place, to be sure, but I was more fascinated with its interesting bits and pieces. 

Firstly, the equipment from what, presumably, had once been a fully functioning petrol station and/or garage. The old Shell pumps looked almost as good as new, and then there was the superb old Automobile Association sign fixed to the wall. That must be at least 90 years old. I love the precision in those measurements: Tregony 10½ miles and 263¼ miles to London!

The sun wasn’t showing his face this day but the sign outside The Rising Sun Hotel gave a hint of how wonderful the harbour must look on a good day.

There were old post boxes too: a George VI box fixed into the post office wall, and an intriguing, much older letter box, with its own protective cover, set into a house wall. I couldn’t even guess how old that must have been.

The fishing paraphernalia stacked along the harbourside was very photogenic, and the St Mawes Harbour Authority hut on the pier was garnished with a rather lovely weathervane that was straining against the full force of Storm Barbara.

But my personal favourites were the eminently sensible signs along the harbour wall. Perhaps the weather in summer is more conducive to diving and swimming – I couldn’t imagine anyone trying it in winter. And what about this last one? Not only does it tell you not to do something but it also provides a reason. I just love it!

I certainly hope to get back to St Mawes one day when the sun is shining, to enjoy a cruise on that pretty harbour, to check out the castle, to wander and explore more fully this charming little town.

We finished off the day with a visit to Porthscatho, another of Roseland’s coastal fishing villages and another with signage to spare! This was also a place where Sarah had holidayed as a child so we walked from one end to the other as she tried to recall which house her family had rented.

Portscatho must have been a fun place to holiday as a child and, as we drove back to our cottage after a lovely first day out and about, we enjoyed sharing memories of rock pools and seashells and sand castles.