Trying to remember some of the things I have read, Alan Bennett’s latest ‘’, his ‘People’ and Alan Sillitoe’s ’Saturday Night and Sunday Morning’. The very large diary and thoughts and play excerpts, ‘Keeping On’. was rather a lot to get through but on the whole highly enjoyable. I say on the whole because Alan is getting to be even more of a Moaning Minnie as he gets older and older. To be fair he realises this himself, and very often his targets are well chosen. The title comes from one evening when he was passing through to a theatre to give a talk, and one of the attendants said “ I see you’re still here then! Keeping on?”. I forget but it sounds like a Northern comment. Alan was quite taken aback as he is feeling his age. The Introductions to the plays were particularly enjoyable, and led me to purchase ‘People’ where he takes on the sacred cow that is the National Trust. His thoughts are like those of a lot of us I suppose……the NT Guides ‘ assume that one wishes to be informed about the room or the furniture and pictures, which I don’t always’. The play has some important underlying messages about lack of funding of the Arts in general, and how should we maintain our historic buildings with families intact. Lots of pathos, nostalgia and humour especially when the Porn Film crew take over the South Yorkshire country house……Talking of nostalgia, what could have pre-possessed me to pick up ‘Saturday Night and Sunday Morning’? Well it must have been talking to our great friends Julia and Allen about their trip to Mallorca. They stayed near Soller and I asked if they had done the walk over the mountains to the extremely beautiful Deia. We had, they hadn’t. But we did it on the recommendation of the great man himself Alan Sillitoe who did a stint for us at Warwick Words just before he died. Whilst we were escorting him to the talk, he told us how he used to live in Soller in Mallorca and often did the walk/bicycle ride himself to visit his great friend Robert Graves who lived in Deia. Much was drunk, and often he had to leave his bicycle there as unable to get on it! He mentioned a farm half way across the walk where you could get fresh orange juice (and needed it), and it still exists ….to our great relief… the juice from the farm was unsurpassed. We searched in the cemetery for Robert’s grave, but despite much effort we didn’t find it. Luckily we caught the last bus back to Soller. Now in its day of course, the early Sixties, the book ( and film with Albert Finney and Rachel Roberts) swept the boards…controversial, explosive ….a novel of today with a freshness and raw fury that ‘makes ‘Room At The Top’ look like a vicarage tea party’ as the Telegraph of the time put it. Re-reading, the grip and pleasure and feel of the times were very, very powerful, and I can honestly say I haven’t enjoyed a book as much for a long time. Set in the midst of the working classes in Nottingham with the hero or anti-hero (who knows?) working by day chained to the lathes at what was obviously Raleigh Cycles (obvious to me as I almost became Distribution Manager there), and by night taking on the world and his mates’ wives, it was/still is writing at its best. What a privilege to have met Alan Sillitoe if only briefly.

Another visit to Cotehele House where we had to pick up our vase bought from the shop there and which we had returned for damage inspection. Popped in to the Hall to see the Christmas Garland for the second time….quite impressive, lots of people viewing it again, but not what I would call spectacular. On this occasion we walked down the hill alongside the marvellous valley gardens (which we must visit in Spring for the Azaleas and other spring shrubs). Plenty of daffs pushing through the jet black soil, and TV reported some in bloom somewhere in the UK on this day…..earlier and earlier. At the end of the garden we took the path to the river and walked to Calstock under the impressive viaduct. Passed some lovely houses, some with yachts moored alongside, but the whole setting is a little oppressive and very damp. Water trickled down the algae encrusted granite. Calstock a pretty little village, and luckily a cafe was open which although specialising in Italian ices did a very cheap cappuccino and we sat on sofas by the wood-burner…rather splendid. On the bank outside we saw some friendly unusual ducks which I have now looked up and they were Muscovy ducks, not at all common and presumably belonging to someone. ‘Muscovy ducks are great on the farm to control insects the natural way. They are particularly helpful controlling flies, grasshoppers, ticks and mosquitos. If you put them in a pen with cows or calves they will eat most of the flies. In one experiment where two year old Muscovy ducks were put in cow pens, the fly population was reduced by 80 to 90 percent’. Why are there not a lot more of them, that’s what I say?! Calstock is in Cornwall, just, looking across to Devon on the opposite side of the river. On the walk we passed a couple of lime kilns, and at one time it was, like many places in Cornwall, the centre of mining and other industry. There was a really well restored chapel with a magnificent picture window and this hosts Arts events.

As it was such a nice day we jumped on the bus to Killigarth and did the beautiful little walk to Polperro…plenty of seats with views on the way and good to arrive in Polperro from the coastal path. I particularly like starting the coastal bit from the cafe at Talland which we can’t wait to visit in season.

To Truro to the Volvo garage and to do some Christmas shopping. On the way into town we saw for the first time a heron actually catch and swallow (with some difficulty it has to be said) rather a sizeable fish.

In the evening we drove to Fowey ( my great favourite after St Ives ), to see the Christmas festival and lantern procession. Very nice atmosphere and the christmas market was surprisingly rather good with nearly all local Cornish firms taking stalls. We bought rather a lot!

Just trying to recall some of my reading over the last year or so, I re-read the whole of the Barchester Towers series, and what a sheer delight that was. It is frankly impossible to read any of the books without imagining as the characters those who played them so well in the now ancient BBC series…especially, I suppose it goes without saying, Nigel Hawthorne. Whereas normally I might find this a problem, in this case not. All of this prompts me to watch the first episode again on UTube….brilliant. A few thousand pages there then. I have also re-visited Morse, reading again all of those engaging novels. Much too complicated for me but highly enjoyable. I got so involved that I bought a couple of books on ‘Morse locations’…I always find this sort of stuff fascinating and in this case the surprise (to me) is that so much of the Morse, Lewis and Endeavour series are filmed outside of Oxford. I have also read lots of books on Cornwall (and Devon as we are only 20 miles away, and somehow I always have this uncomfortable feeling that I would rather be in Devon (where we lived once) than Cornwall. I now have quite a local library including the Bradt ’Slow’ series for Devon and Cornwall which are interesting reads in their own right but also never fail to come up with things to do which perhaps one wouldn’t have thought of (kayaking for instance, of which more later).

A few days with our good friends Allan and Julia who live in Northumberland but had never visited Devon or Cornwall. I’m afraid I always seem to rush them around all over the place…no sooner had we picked them up at Exeter airport than we were off to Dartmouth, and Kingsbridge (the long way home), and then in the following few days we were helter-skelter to St Ives, Portleven, Padstow, Looe, Polperro and probably many other places I can’t remember. St Ives was windy but pleasant and we had a lovely time at Padstow taking the ferry to Rock, and walking along the beach until we found a nice place to picnic.

Hopefully they will visit again before too long when I will give them a more restful time. But we also took advantage of their visit to catch up with news and to seek detailed advice on our furnishings, decor and picture placement (both having an expert eye). It was very interesting indeed to hear about Allan’s brother  Trevor Frankland, sadly no longer with us, who was a well-known artist in modern circles and past President of the Royal Watercolour Society. We have seen some of his work in Allan’s house….very impressive.

Another welcome visit from daughter and grand daughter…always nice to see them of course, but as with any visitors it encourages you to get out and about…not that we need any encouragement, but I don’t think we would have visited Lappa Valley theme park and zoo without grand daughter being here! Apart from adventure things there is a train which circuits the park, indoor things to do and some really lovely animals to see and pat…we really loved the shire horses and the Gloucester Old Spot pigs. Everything seemed healthy and well-cared for which is great to see. After the excitement of Lappa it was therapeutic to then traipse off to the sands and enjoy the things you

do at the sea-side including in this case exploring caves……

Another day, another treat and I haven’t enjoyed myself so much in a long time…we drove to Babbacombe and there visited the quite marvellous model village which is extensive and set in a bowl in the hills which is both lush and pretty.

Not only was it fascinating to see period details, and see working models in terms of trains, fire brigade action in putting out a fire to a thatched roof (!), but there was also opportunity to have a go yourself…I can’t wait to go again and was only sorry we couldn’t return in the evening to see the whole thing at night. I think the others enjoyed it too!

On the way home Dartmouth wasn’t too much of a diversion and an opportunity to buy and have a picnic looking over the estuary. We used to own a fruit and veg shop ‘Crisp and Green’ here, and whenever we return I wonder why we left. But in truth we had bigger things in mind plus, when strolling along the harbour in the morning having bought my newspaper and dodging the shirt-sleeved holidaymakers, I could never make my mind up whether I was working or on holiday myself, a strange and unsettling feeling.

On the last day of the visit, we took Katherine and Aiisha on our short walk along the coastal path to the Black Rock cafe and beach. Short, but not short with a 3 year-old in tow. Anyway once more we enjoyed the delights of the seaside including an ice-cream of course.

Mind you it can all be a little tiring….

Another visit to the NT’s Cothele where not only do we love the house and gardens but we like the shop where we have bought several things made by local artists. And this time we found the folly on top of the hill at the rear of the property. A most impressive triangular tower where to climb it you have to use some of the wind-up torches provided by the NT. When you reach the top and stand on the roof the views are spectacular.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The gardens were wonderful at this time of year. We enjoyed the cut flower garden where the gardeners were picking for the house bouquets, and the yellow garden (as well as the white and other colours!)…..

and, on this visit the apples were to be seen on the trees in the orchard full of old Cornish varieties….this used to be a very important market garden area supplying London on a daily basis. We also wandered down to Cotehele quay for our picnic lunch by the river, and to look into the fascinating museum about Cotehele’s industrial past…the restored old quay master’s office was particularly atmospheric.

A long weekend in London, and we went with David and Jennifer to Richmond. The site of Richmond Palace was particularly interesting to me as I was in the middle of reading Wolf Hall again and it was of course the favourite palace of most of the Tudors. Some lovely bijou houses around there as well..

Then a stroll along the Thames and an ice-creambrought a lovely day out to a close…

The following day was mainly a day of window shopping in central London, which I love to do as the window displays themselves are so much better than you find anywhere else. We were particularly taken with the windows of Selfridges and their Shakespearian theme..how imaginative they were. And I can never think of Selfridges without thinking back to the biography of the original Mr Selfridge, and the times when, bankrupt, and having been kicked off the Board of the retail empire he founded and built, he used to shuffle past the London store in his old clothes and look longingly at the windows himself. How are the mighty fallen………..