Road Trip Down Memory Lane

Mom and I spent a large majority of Wednesday driving and walking through places she had been before with different people, places that hold fond memories for her and that she wished to share with me.

Our first stop was Zennor. We walked through the town, pausing at St. Senara’s Church, famous for its mermaid chair. (If you want to know more about the interesting legend, here’s the Wikipedia page, which does a fairly good job of explaining the story: Mermaid of Zennor) She took me out to the steps of the nearby coastal path, the infamous place where my grandma swears up and down Mom was trying to kill her (with excessive walking). At least, she used to. This March marked the one-year anniversary of my grandma’s death. A lot has happened in that year. Unfortunately, life doesn’t stop when we lose people. Thankfully, we always have those memories we can go back to so no one really ever leaves us, even when they are gone or far away. Our own sort of time travel.

Next we went just a little ways to the Carn Galver Tin Mine and Bosigran to see the place where one of my mom’s friends loved to go rock climbing. We even saw two guys gearing up to go climbing. I love ruins, walking, and views of the coast, so basically, it was a perfect area. The walk out to the cliffs was a bit muddy from the torrential downpour the previous night, but it was just so nice to be out in the countryside. The wind was strong, even by Abilene standards, but it really wasn’t too cold for hiking. I could’ve sat out there for a long while.

Bosigran cliffs

Carn Galver Tin Mine view from Bosigran

But there was still more to see! We kept moving west to visit more ruins. We saw Lanyon Quoit, Men-an-Tol, Men Scryfa, Boskednan (also known as the Nine Maidens stone circle), and an almost completely intact tin mine. It was kind of tricky getting to each place without stepping in mud puddles up to our ankles, but neither of us ended up with much dirt on us at all. It was quite amazing really. Dancing, it really does help with balance! So a big shout out to the wonderful people of Arthur Murray who helped give me the ability to jump from rock to rock with ease. The biggest trouble we came across was when we somehow lost the main footpath, had to hop a fence and trudge through this water-logged field to get to the road. Didn’t run in to anyone or any animals, though, so really not a big deal at all.

Lanyon Quoit

Men-an-Tol

Our final stop (because, really, where can you go from here?) was Land’s End. I have now been to the furthest west land point in England. Pretty cool, huh? We were both fairly tired after having walked most of the day, so we didn’t stay too long.

At Land's End

It was a long and adventurous day. I’ve always known that walking is my favourite exercise, but I’ve developed a new love for mild hiking. As I’ve said, I just love to be out in nature, so having all these coastal paths, public land that anyone can walk on, is fantastic! I’m not ready to go scale rock cliffs or anything, but traversing fields to go see old ruins, definitely my cup of tea.

So Mom and I have been together for a week now, and so far things are going very well (not that I expected otherwise). It’s hard to believe that I’ll be back in the States a week from now though. The more time goes by, the more I’m actually looking forward to being home. As nice as it is to be in hotel instead of a hostel, I miss having my own room and my own bed and not having to wear the same four or five things over and over. You’d never know I changed clothes this whole semester by the look of my pictures! Still, I don’t want this next week to go by too quickly…