How about this then? Today was the big day when we actually” crossed the line” at Porthallow, the official HALFWAY point on the South West Coast Path! Three "Hurrahs!!! The modern monolith at the back of the beach is enormous and covered in abstract poetry ideally chosen for its local surroundings. Also very fitting is the fact that the nearest building is a pub, but it’s not quite so fitting with its name “The Five Pilchards”. How about something more original such as “The Halfway House”? Anyway from now on its down hill all the way,or maybe even “onwards and upwards”, although on the SWCP the “onwards” are often “downwards”, too! Oh,the Grand Old Duke of Cornwall, he had ten thousand men.......
This section of the Path is significantly different from the norm once you have left Coverack well behind, for it offers soft, low-lying fields with raised beaches and very little of the mountain-like hills of earlier sections. Incongruous in a way, as it has more of the appearance of the parkland of a stately home, but it was none the less welcome for all that.
Sadly the crossing of the Gillan Creek could not be assisted by the ferryman as there was no ferryman on duty today! And the instruction to”jump up and down and wave your hands in the air” to attract the attention of some nonchalant passing boatsman 300 yards away on the opposite bank of the estuary ,was a tad mis-guided. So it was off to the alternative route with an additional 2-mile trek to cross the estuary by bridge.Thank you very much, Gillan Creek. But the Helford ferry was much more user-friendly and highly dependable: thanks be to Helford. Soon our final destination , Falmouth, sprinted into view and before long I was tucking into some delicious home-made soup and home-baked bread, courtesy of Pat’s brother-in-law, Tim, who also taxied us to our next accommodation in a 6-berth caravan near Par where we would be joined by our daughter, Alison and our son, Neil plus our scallywag grandchildren, Maddie,9, and Lucy (of the broken arm) 8, tomorrow. And so to bed.
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