Day 8: Tintagel. 17 October 2008

The day started badly as my camera had no charge. Had no idea the battery would leak, but it seemed to charge quickly enough and I was soon away to North Cornwall again. My journeys are under an hour now. Comparing that with journeys of an hour and a half up to the Devon border and we can see that I am making good progress.

I parked in Bossiney to avoid the tourist parking charges in Tintagel. I never understand why Cornish people often pay for parking when there is always free parking within five or ten minutes walk. Still, people don’t like walking these days.

Lots of road walking today, so I opted for the trainers. This is the most densely populated area in terms of numbers of settlements. I visited a total of fourteen places in just five and a half hours of walking. I walked along the road, passing Bossiney Methodist Church, fairly standard Methodist church fare for North Cornwall. This is one of five churches within about a mile in the Tintagel/Bossiney area.

After exiting the village, I headed down to the coast and was presented with perhaps the most spectacular coastline so far. The exposed section of coast around Tintagel has been shaped by the storms over the centuries and would look amazing on any postcard. It didn’t take me long to reach the equally spectacular Rocky Valley. This has been shaped by a stream which has cut through sheer cliffs. Coming up through the valley, I passed the ruins of a mill and came up to the B-road connecting Tintagel with Boscastle. I headed along this road, and after about ten minutes, came to Trethevey.

Trethevey is an ancient hamlet, which has grown over recent years and now has three rows of modern houses, each seaward facing and with large windows suitable for looking out over the Atlantic. I was more interested, however, in the ancient church, which looked like nothing more than a barn from the outside. In fact, apart from the sign, there was nothing to indicate this was a place of worship of any description. I was disappointed to read of recent restoration, because, on stepping inside, I felt as if I had stepped back 500 years. The place was damp, cold and extremely primitive. I would even go as far as saying that I didn’t think buildings like this existed anymore! Nearby, was St Piran’s Well. Although this doesn’t date from a time anywhere near St Piran, I find it interesting that many buildings and monuments over the centuries make references to our national saint.

I changed from my planned route at this point, as I wanted to see the waterfall which had been so attractively signposted using a plank of wood and a beaten-up road cone. While it’s easy to find this amusing, it is so symptomatic of the apathetic way in which Cornwall promotes its attractions. I was to find more evidence of this later on. The route took me down into a beautiful wooded valley. I didn’t find the waterfall as this would have taken me further from my planned route, so I headed back to a minor road at Halgabron, which was a collection of small cottages, one of which was being used as an art gallery.

From here, I headed almost directly south for about two miles along a minor road passing through the hamlets of Trenale (the smallest I have ever seen with a village green) and Downrow. One thing that was great about the day was that I had a sea view for virtually the whole walk. This was because nearly the whole walk was on the side of a hill which went up to Condolden Barrow, which, at 308 metres above sea level, makes it one of the few points in Cornwall outside of Bodmin Moor above 300 metres.

The minor road brought me out at Trewarmett, which is on the main road to Camelford. Trewarmett was probably a bad choice of location for a main road as the houses are too close to the road! I expect the traffic frequently comes to a standstill as many of the hordes of tourists use this route to access Tintagel. There are some pubs and amenities in the village which take advantage of the tourism capabilities of the local area. From Trewarmett, I had a mile and a half walk up hill (towards Camelford) to Penpethy, having no idea what I would find there. I was not in good spirits about this walk, as I knew I would have to backtrack along the same road and didn’t know whether I would be able to qualify Penpethy as one of my places visited. Fighting my way through the traffic (this road was not built for pedestrians!) and roadworks, I reached Penpethy and was relieved to find something there. A garage, tourist attraction and few houses were enough to qualify Penpethy. The tourist attraction in question is the Pixie House, a place all children love looking out of the car windows at as they go past. I remember a reference to this place on Radio One a year or so ago. It was presented as a mythical place in the far away land of Cornwall. The presenter wondered if anyone had any information on it, and a couple of people got in touch to say it was rubbish... and they were right! I couldn’t believe it – this unique, quirky attraction had been turned in to a scrapyard/building site, with a really beautiful old house and pixies behind. This is another example of where Cornwall is letting itself down in the area of tourism, the thing it should be doing best.

I headed back down the hill towards the sea again. The most prominent features along this road are the slate quarries. I turned left to head down towards Trebarwith. I found a nice picnic area next to a stream, where I had my egg butties. I then carried on down the road, veering left after a short while, up the track towards the deliciously named Fentafriddle Farm. I came off the track and started to go through the fields towards Trebarwith village, loving the fact that I was offroad for the first time since Rocky Valley, about six miles ago. I’ve never been to Trebarwith Village despite numerous visits to the Strand. Just coming into the hamlet, I crossed a field with some magnificent red cows. As well as being fine specimens to look at, they were also a lot less aggressive than the traditional black and white variety (In fact, the other day I found out that my fear of cows does have some substance as some walkers were recently trampled by a herd). The sign at the farm told me that they were Pedigree Red Ruby Devons. Trebarwith itself is nothing more than a couple of houses and a couple of farms, so it was time to hit the sea again.

It was about a fifteen minute walk down through some more fields to get to Trebarwith Strand. This beach is, in my opinion, completely unique. I would be surprised if there is another like it anywhere in the world. The sea has carved out a natural causeway through the rocks down to an absolute gem of a beach which is only visible a couple of hours either side of low tide. The waves are almost always powerful (even when the rest of the sea around Cornwall is calm) and it’s also one of Cornwall’s most dangerous beaches, with people getting washed off the rocks by freak waves from time to time. I went down on the beach – by this time the sun had come out and it felt like the best place in the world. The settlement itself is mainly holiday homes, art galleries and a couple of tourist shops, but I think there are some permanent residents as well. I have to say a couple of the holiday homes are in an absolute peach of a location – that would be a dream home.

I came back up the road, then off to the left up a steep slope to Treknow and its smaller sister village, Trelake. I guess these villages must have been built for the nearby slate quarries, but now seem to be mostly occupied as retirement homes.

Coming north out of Treknow brought me back to the Tintagel to Camelford road, and Tregatta, a few houses on a sharp bend. A short way up the road was Treven, a linear hamlet which contains Tintagel’s only school. I backtracked to Tregatta where I turned right to head down to the Parish Church of St Materiana. This church is surprisingly small, but has an awesome clifftop location, and has remained there, virtually unchanged for around 900 years – pretty impressive. From here, it was a short walk into Tintagel, my largest settlement of the day.

Tintagel does well, and probably always will do. It is internationally known as the legendary birthplace of King Arthur and is therefore one of the places in Cornwall which experiences 12 month tourism. Whether or not Arthur existed and how much he actually had to do with Cornwall will always be disputed, but we know that there was something or someone of great importance here, around the sixth century when Arthur was supposed to have lived. There’s no doubt that Arthur is good for Cornwall. The numbers that come each year in pursuit of his legend must be in the thousands. I think it’s a bit sad that you have to pay to see the castle, because this effectively cuts off some unbelievable coastline for those who can’t pay. The castle remains that still exist actually date from about 1200, roughly 700 years after Arthur was supposed to live, so we know this is not “King Arthur’s Castle” as so many tourists go away believing.

The village of Tintagel is like a local centre for the local area. It has plenty of shops, pubs, local amenities and most importantly, a football club who currently play in the Duchy league division three, the 17th level of English football. Tintagel differs from Boscastle in that it is built high up on the cliffs and none of it down by the sea. It’s a lovely village, but far too overtouristed for me to want to live there. From Tintagel, it was a short walk back along the road to my car.

Just a final note: Earlier this year I visited a tourist attraction called King Arthur’s Great Halls. It was AWFUL and I hated it. It’s this kind of tourist rubbish which has failed everywhere else because it treats tourists like idiots. Tourists, by and large, are idiots, but it is a testament to the sheer amount of tourism that a venue of this quality can still operate. Seriously, don’t go there. Even if it’s raining and blowing a gale, don’t go there: Pay your money to go and see the castle ruins. Then walk past the ruins (which have nothing to do with Arthur), go out to the end of the headland, stand dangerously close to the edge, watch huge Atlantic rollers crash against breathtakingly beautiful cliffs, let the wind pound you, and for once, feel alive. There’s nothing better.

Day 8 stats:

Places visited 14 (total 67): Bossiney (GR064887), Trethevey (077893), Halgabron (072887), Trenale (069879), Downrow (069877), Trewarmett (066865), Penpethy (082862), Trebarwith (056860), Trebarwith Strand (049864), Trelake (057867), Treknow (056869), Tregatta (055875), Treven (057877), Tintagel (057884)

Altitude gained: 490 metres. Total: 4,875m

Highest altitude reached: 220m (at Penpethy)

Distance walked: 14 miles (total 129), 10 on-road (76) and 4 off-road (53)

Started walking: 9.15am. Finished walking: 2.45pm

Map used: OS Explorer 111

To view all the day's photos, visit this address:

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