Surprises. There is no shortage of them on any adventure.
I always have a mental image of a place before I arrive. The Old Coastguard could only be one of those typical solid, whitewashed pubs dimly lit by lanterns which has withstood Atlantic wind and waves for centuries. Yet here I am looking across a large wood polished floor towards a row of french windows opening onto a large veranda. The veranda leads onto an expansive garden with a perfectly kept grass lawn that leads down a hill transected by a light gravel path. Bordering this path, tall palm trees drowsily rustle their leaves. The view looks south out to sea. There are beer garden tables dotted here and there with couples dressed for dinner enjoying the soft warmth of the evening. The effect is more Reid’s Hotel, Madeira, than smugglers pub. How lovely to be proved so wrong.
A young woman welcomes me warmly. ‘Oh, you must be the one I spoke to on the phone. I’m sure we can find you something. You might just have to be gone by eight o’clock.’
Not a problem.
I walk in: my hair salty, black shorts, black sweatshirt, worn Nike Runner trainers, black Over Board rucksack which is really a matt black tube with straps. I have walked into smart hotels or restaurants looking like this before. As long as you can pay it shouldn’t matter what you look like.
I decide to push the boat out. A Negroni with big cubes. It looks as good as it tastes. The dirty red catching the last of the sun’s light inside my drink.
I eat an excellent gurnard starter followed by duck with lentils. And a glass of fine Italian wine. I think briefly about the cost and then think what does it matter? I’m not paying for accommodation.
After dinner I go to the harbour. It’s one of those summer evenings that linger in the memory. The air is still warm. The wind has dropped. It is totally still. The sunlight is starting to transform into oranges and pinks in the clouds. It’s reflected in the glassiness of the water inside the harbour walls where small boats lie about like bath toys.
On December 19th 1981 the Penlee lifeboat launched from just outside Mousehole to attempt to help a ship, the Union Star, whose ‘engines had failed in heavy seas‘. Both boats disappeared. 16 men lost their lives including eight life boat volunteers.
Every year Mousehole has spectacular Christmas lights which are put on between 5 and 11pm each night for the whole of the festive period. On December 19th they turn them off as a mark of respect for the Penlee lifeboat men.
I’ve had a gentle time of it so far today but now I need to get moving and find somewhere to sleep.
Outside Mousehole the path becomes steep with thick foliage. The path is interrupted by rocks, some that come up to my knees. It’s getting darker and it becomes a challenge to clamber over them.
The negative thoughts start to rear up at me: what if I turn an ankle on one of these rocks? What if the path just continues like this for another hour or more? Is this the night I won’t discover a suitable place to sleep?
Yet in all my experiences it does turn out all right in the end.
After climbing some more I reach a long thin wood that leads towards Kemyel Point. The twilight is giving way to night proper. Inside the wood it is like a room at night with the light turned off. I fumble for my phone and turn the torch on. There are branches on the ground but otherwise the path is clear enough. I don’t feel spooked. I’m too focused on getting to a place where I can bed down for the night.
I’m only in the wood for a few minutes. I come out and the path now is flat and bordered by bracken. At one point there is a thin space of grass between the path and bracken, a sort of lay-by for pedestrians. I lie down it but it doesn’t feel right.
While I stand and ponder what to do I suddenly feel a searing, stinging pain in the back of my lower leg inside my sock and then 3 times more in quick succession. What the…?! I’m quickly at my shoes and shocks tearing them off and rubbing the stings. I still don’t know what it was. It was more painful than a wasp. I’ve tried researching it but without any answer. The stings blew up into big bumps and itched maddeningly for two weeks after.
Minutes later I stop with a sigh. The gentle breath of the sea comforts my panicked animal heart. I can see her white froth dimly in the half light. I have reached a place where the path opens out onto a cliff top and the surface is short stunted grass and plates of granite.
I wander back and forth for 5 minutes. I soon realise it’s perfect. The grass is flat and dry so that I can point my toes to the sea and have a relatively flat plate of rock as my bedside table. The wind is low here. I put the Sigg bottle, tooth brush, eye mask and sleeping pills on the rock and make my bed. I rub antiseptic cream on the stings and change my socks.
I’m tired and the stings, well, they sting but otherwise I’m comfortable and warm. The gentle murmur of wind and sea offer me company. Sleeping and waking with the waves is like sleeping next to a sleeping beast. It calms me. The cosiness of my sleeping bag is finer than a four poster bed. I can see across to St Michael’s Mount. Lights are twinkling along the route of my recent past. Praa Sands, Porthleven, Lizard Point – its lighthouse winking down there at the most southerly point. With a break to my usual devotion to simplicity I watch the first few games of Emma Raducanu in the Women’s US Open Final. She’ll go on to win it.
Within minutes my battery falters and sleep beckons, lush and heavy like an opiate. Tomorrow there’ll be more surprises.
The Slow Walker 