I’ve just returned from a weekend retreat in Cawsand on the Rame Peninsula in Cornwall. Three days of relaxation, exercise, learning about nutrition and good sleep practice, all in a lovely seaside setting with delicious home-cooked food and good company. So thanks Charlie Babb and Emma Porter of Prime Wellness Retreats – I don’t generally advertise on this site, but had a great time and wanted to say “thanks”.
I did a couple of early morning solo walks before the day started in earnest, looking for my usual unconsidered trifles to photograph. Kingsand and Cawsand are two adjacent villages that were, until 1844, separated by the Devon/Cornwall county boundary, as evidenced by this sign on a house just down from where we were staying:
Both are exceedingly picturesque, with colour-washed houses and narrow streets to explore (verging on the twee in places – holiday lets with extravagant floral wreaths and bunting for instance). From the number of keysafes by doors, I’d guess that not many Cornish people live there any more – an all-too-common phenomenon in attractive coastal settlements.
I was, needless to say, distracted from all that eye candy by some rusty bits and interesting architectural details. Who doesn’t love a nice downpipe (oh, is it only me?)
I was soon lured by the natural history though. Most of this coast is Devonian rock, dark red and green mudstone and siltstone, but there’s an unusual outcrop of much rougher-looking rhyolite (volcanic rock) on the beach east of Kingsand. It’s much more recent than the Devonian, dating from the Permian period.
We also went on a group walk from Cawsand west to Rame Head, and I enjoyed the wildflowers on the way.
I could go on (Cawsand has what must be the most artistically pleasing bus shelter in Cornwall for instance), but that’s probably enough for now!