Cornwall 2008 - Midlands Weather Forum

News Bot · #1 (**Link to Post**) 13-Apr-2008, 23:53

Firstly, i apologise for the width of this blog (due to the photos) but also the length

. I know it's a pretty long blog but I just tried to cram my holiday into a small article.

Monday 7th April 2008
I started my journey to Cornwall from Kent at 7.30am. Everything outside was covered in quite a lot of snow at the beginning of the journey – it seemed strange that I was going on holiday when there’s snow outside! Anyway as I travelled further west the snow cover gradually declined. I travelled through 8 counties – Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire, Wiltshire, Somerset, Devon and eventually Cornwall which took just over 8 hours of travelling time. The snow become more scarce and only remained in well-shaded regions of West Sussex before there was no snow cover to be seen in Hampshire.

Below - some road-side snow in West Sussex and The Alps of Hampshire (ie the South Downs as seen from Petersfield):

I arrived at my holiday destination, Callington, around 4.30pm. Apart from visiting the nearby Tesco in Launceston, I did not venture anywhere that evening.

The following photos relate to the map below, which shows where I visited on which days (colour coded, see key for more info).

Tuesday 8th April 2008
Today I travelled to the Eden Project in Saint Blazey, near to St Austell. I was surprised at how big the whole place was, all built in an old and disused quarry. There was a free Park & Ride ‘bendy-bus’ from all of the car parks, which were numbered after various fruit, to the entrance to the Eden Project.

The Eden Project has two main ‘biomes’ (the large weirdly-shaped greenhouses it’s famous for). One was for tropical plants, the other for Mediterranean plants. I have to admit the tropical plants biome was very hot and humid, especially at the top with the sun shining on you. Water was sprayed from taps throughout the biome.

The Med plants biome was, in comparison, cold. It was also smaller and housed many more familiar plants, plenty of tulips too.
It’s a great attraction for any plant lovers out there.

There was undercover ice skating and also another building called “The Core”. Its structure is based on the shape of a sunflower, and when looked at from above, does resemble a sunflower. Inside are various displays, a mixed assortment really but the main attraction inside the building is a structure known as “The Seed”. It’s an egg-shaped lump of rock, cleverly crafted and placed at the centre of The Core. There is a short video projected onto a screen which is free to view and which explains the purpose of The Seed and how it was created.

Below – An inside view of The Core, The Seed which is in the centre of The Core, and the WEE Man outside the complex which has been made completely out of recycled products:

On the way home we encountered a very heavy hail storm on Bodmin Moor which caused a few accidents and injuries to some people.

Wednesday 9th April 2008
Today I travelled the 60-odd miles to Land’s End, the most western point of Great Britain. It cost £3 to get into the car park where you can park the car and then take a look around the shops and restaurants or go for walks along the coastline on well-signed paths.

I stayed at Land’s End for a good 3 hours, before travelling back towards Penzance when I spotted St Michael’s Mount (below), which, when the tide is out, is easy to access by foot along a causeway. Unfortunately, as the photo shows, the tide was in when I arrived there.

Another long trip down the road and I arrived at Lizard Point, the most southern point of Great Britain. Unlike Land’s End, parking was free and there were hardly any shops there, most were back in the village a mile away called “The Lizard”.

Just round the corner from Lizard Point is the satellite dishes belonging to BT’s Goonhilly Earth Station. I had hoped to have a look around them as I was in the area, but unfortunately I arrived at 5.30pm, and they closed at 5pm. So I was left with a couple of shots of the satellite dishes from a distance.

Thursday 10th April 2008
Today I visited Plymouth, both its city centre and the seafront. I took Brett’s advice and had to pay £1 to cross the Tamar Bridge from Cornwall to Devon. Lol.
I took the Park & Ride from the Plymouth Argyle home ground car park, into the city centre. It was a very nice place to visit, unfortunately the Tourist Information was poorly signed and I never found it in the end

.

In the afternoon I took a stroll down to the seafront, to a place called “The Hoe”. It was very scenic with good views but pretty chilly in the brisk wind - I took a couple of shots of the area.

Below – Various views of The Hoe:

Friday 11th April 2008
Travelling home day – nothing much exciting happened today, although I did manage to get a small shot of the distant Stonehenge:

Click here to be taken to Dollsworth's Blog...

Midlands Weather Forum

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
Two die as bad weather hits Cornwall	Grant	UK Weather Chat	2	05-Mar-2007 18:22
Media thread: Cornwall suffers flash floods	Grant	UK Weather Chat	0	22-Oct-2006 22:20
Hailstorm in Cornwall 17th Oct 06	LeeKay	TV, Media & Internet	1	18-Oct-2006 15:28