Springtime in Cornwall

Maude, the French WWOOFer arrived at lunchtime on Monday and seemed very nice and keen to work. In the afternoon she cut down the brambles that were growing in between the raspberry canes at the bungalow, while I carried on with the job I had started in the morning – painting the outside loo! Well, the plumber had arrived, so I couldn’t really do anything in the house.

On Tuesday it was a beautiful day and we spent all morning barrowing loads of topsoil from behind the barn up to the vegetable garden to fill in the old pond just inside the gate to enable James to safely get the tractor in to do the rotovating. The top soil had been in a large heap for a number of years and had compacted somewhat - we had to use a pickaxe to break it up enough to shovel into the wheelbarrows. It took 18 wheelbarrows to fill what looked like a small hole but, as I said to James, they were ‘girlie’ wheelbarrow loads as we didn’t have the physical strength to have them really full! It got so warm that eventually I was working in my T-shirt but, unfortunately, I didn’t think to up my fluid intake accordingly and ended up retiring to bed at 7.30 with a migraine – no, I don’t expect sympathy – I know I don’t drink enough. Maude was very concerned about me and the next day made sure I drank several glasses of water.

Maude left again on Thursday (I don’t think it was anything I said!) because she found out that she had a job interview back home in Brittany, and as she has not had a paid job since she finished her studies 7 months ago, she felt she had to go back and attend. It was a shame really, as we were getting on quite well and I was beginning to remember a lot of basic French from my school days (thank you, Miss Archer, you may have scared your classes witless but at least we learned something!), so there were some simple language lessons going on most of the time that we worked together. For instance, she would ask me what the time was as she didn't have a watch, I would tell her in English and then she would say 'and in French?'

On Wednesday afternoon, another glorious sunny day, Maude and I went for a circular walk along the lane from the farm, down another lane to the old mill (now a rather lovely house), back along the strip of land between the old mill leat and the River Inney, and up through Jo and James’ wood back to the farm. On the way we passed ‘my cottage’, which I first discovered back in November and have thought a lot about since. It is situated on a very quiet lane, facing east with magnificent views across a wooded valley and not another house in sight. It is also empty, locked and semi-derelict. My heart is drawn to this little cottage, it is so sad and I want to make it happy again. At the moment it is still probably saveable with a lot of hard work and quite a lot of money, but the upstairs windows are broken and have been for a long time, the window frames are rotten and the outhouse that once housed the ‘bathroom’ has caved in. How do I know all this? Because, dear readers, I had a damned good snoop about one day back in December! It has a lovely (well, you have to use your imagination a bit) south facing garden and would be ripe to re-do as an eco-home; ground source heat pump, bore hole, solar panels, etc. etc. Unfortunately, I have been told that the people who own it want it to fall down so that they can try and get planning permission to build a bigger, modern home on land adjacent to the site. Ugh! It shouldn’t be allowed – this is a traditional Cornish cottage with a large inglenook (judging by the size of the chimney – I did not break in!) and deserves to be saved! Perhaps I should write to the local council and see if I could get it listed? That would stop them allowing it to fall down. Okay – rant over.

We continued on our walk and saw primroses and celandines all along the hedgebanks and then we startled a deer that bounded across in front of us, forded the river in two bounds and disappeared up the slope on the other side of the valley. We also heard the woodpecker in the oak wood and the buzzards mewing overhead. The season seems to be so well-advanced down here that I wouldn’t be surprised to see returning swallows before I leave on 1st April.

The days here pass in a contented blur, so much so that I cannot remember from day to day exactly what I have been doing – suffice it to say that the majority of the time has been spent doing things at the bungalow, although I did make some bread yesterday using the recipe I tried at Cusgarne, and yesterday afternoon and most of today I have had an enormous bonfire! Bliss! It never ceases to amaze me how small a pile of ash is left after burning massive amounts of branches and twigs, quite magical......and also extremely therapeutic.

Back to Lucky Launceston!

The Lemon Drizzle cake and the scones (both plain and raisin) went down a storm, so I shall definitely try the cake recipe again. The second week at the organic farm was pretty similar to the first week – I spent the greater part of three days in the packing room making up the miscellaneous boxes i.e. the special orders. There is a standard box too so we had to bag up potatoes and carrots and onions for those – I got to be quite good at estimating what 500g of carrots looked like! The weather did improve in that it stopped raining but, unfortunately, it meant that the nights got even colder – I resorted to a hot water bottle in the end as well as the layers already mentioned. However, the clear night skies and lack of light pollution did mean that you could see thousands, if not millions, of stars – it was fantastic.

On the Monday of the second week a new WWOOFer arrived, Anna from Germany, so for a few days we were a very cosmopolitan bunch. She had just come from WWOOFing with Lawrence and Karen at Lee near Ilfracombe, so it was great to hear how they were all doing. We all went into Truro on Wednesday afternoon to do a bit of shopping but also to look round the cathedral. It is a beautiful building; quite simple in design but full of light and soaring pillars and some of the loveliest stone and wood carvings I have ever seen. Afterwards, we went to a Thorntons cafe where I splashed out on a Thorntons Hot Chocolate with cream and marshmallows and extra chocolate shavings on the top! Mallory and Adele were leaving on the Friday to go to Bristol for the weekend before starting at new places, and Mallory asked if I could give them a lift into Redruth to catch their coach. It was only after I’d said yes that she revealed that it left at 5.40 AM! On Wednesday, the weather was really cold and icy first thing but it suddenly warmed up and we ended up eating lunch outside – I realised at that moment how nice it must be here in a good summer. It was my turn to cook lunch so I made vegetarian Cornish Pasties (substituting cubed cheese for meat) and these were well received – just as well really as it took ages to dice the vegetables!

We walked to the local pub on Thursday evening for farewell drinks and didn’t get back until 11.30, then I couldn’t sleep properly and at 5.00am Adele woke me. The car was covered in ice and it took a good ten minutes of de-icing and scraping before we were ready to go. My in-car thermometer told me that the outside temperature was 24 F – about -5 or 6 C, I think (I really must read how to change the reading to Centigrade) and was the lowest I’d seen it all winter – mind you I’m not normally up at 5.00am to register it. I got the girls to Redruth in plenty of time, but decided there was no point in going back to bed so I would drive somewhere and watch the sunrise. For some bizarre reason I decided that Falmouth was a good place to go, but having driven round the town centre (twice) and got lost in a strange pedestrianised one-way system, I gave up on that idea and started back towards Cusgarne. The sky was paling in the east and I became aware that all around me were the ruins of tin mines reaching their silent chimneys to the sky so, following my nose and a very narrow lane, I drove towards one of them and managed to get a photo of the sun rising behind it by climbing up a hedgebank and balancing precariously on the top. I then drove back to Cusgarne and cooked myself breakfast before starting work.

I decided to leave Cusgarne on Saturday instead of Monday, as there was little point in staying on my days off, and Jo and James had already said I was welcome at Launceston. I’d intended to leave at about 10.00am but, while I was up at the farm shop collecting my boots and waterproof trousers, a phone call came through from a wholesaler that Greg sells to, saying he needed 10Kg of Purple Sprouting Broccoli by lunchtime. Greg was away and the only person able to pick the PSB was Thomas, Greg’s second-in-command. It seemed mean to leave him to pick that much by himself, so I volunteered to help – well, it was a lovely sunny day and it didn’t take that long to pick.

I arrived at Launceston at 1.30 and was welcomed with open arms by Jo, James and their grandchildren, Ella and Christopher. Then I was fed homemade soup and bread and later taken on a tour of inspection of the almost-but-not-quite-finished bungalow that Nathaniel and I started decorating back in November. They’d stripped out the old shower cubicle that had been situated in one of the bedrooms and the vanity unit in another bedroom, both of which drained into the flower bed outside – very unconventional, and had also removed the bathroom suite – a plumber is allegedly coming on 14th March to reinstate it. As well as that they had re-papered and painted the sitting room and both the remaining bedrooms that I hadn’t done, so they have not been idle since I was last here! There is a certain amount of urgency attached to finishing the decorating as the first holiday let is the second week in April – it’s always good to work to a deadline!

On Sunday I walked down to the oak wood and the river taking Jess, the collie, with me. We startled a roe deer in the wood – I just saw a white rump disappearing through the trees, and then we came across a huge drift of daffodils growing on the edge of the wood and cascading down the bank into the field below – spring has really arrived. In the afternoon, we had the first (I hope) of several bonfires to burn up the remnants of the hedgelaying and orchard pruning that has also taken place since I was last here. It was a beautiful day with an immense, cloudless blue sky above and all the birds chirruping in the trees, and the chickens scratching around for tasty morsels in the hedgebanks. The most wonderful feeling of peace and tranquillity stole over me – I wish I could somehow bottle that feeling and open it on days when I feel blue – or send it to Jeni who, sadly, is still struggling to cope with her broken heart in Bolivia.

Work started in earnest on Monday when we all went up to the bungalow, Jo to strip wooden kitchen cabinet doors, James to start laying a laminate floor in the dining room and me to paint the kitchen walls and so it has continued all week. It never ceases to amaze me how long these things take to do, mainly because other jobs become apparent as you work and need to be done too. However, after a week we can see a big difference and soon we will have to wait for the plumber to do the bathroom before we can do the finishing touches.

I have already been to two social occasions since arriving: one was to Jo’s local WI meeting which was held in Lezant (about two miles away). It is a small WI but everyone was very friendly and great fun, and the other was to a Pampered Chef party (like a Tupperware party or Virgin Vie, but selling kitchen/baking equipment). There was a free raffle and guess who won the prize? Yes, it was me (I won a raffle prize at their school Xmas Bingo back in December, too) and I am now the proud owner of a very well designed garlic press! I’ve decided that this must be some sort of a sign (as yet I don’t know of what) and my luck continued when I booked my car into the local garage for its MOT and it passed first time without any problems – Lucky Launceston indeed!

Another WWOOFer arrives on Monday – she is young and French, so I hope we get on alright.