Boog's Blog

Saltram house and gardens. National trust tea room with excellent ginger cake.

http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/saltram/

Walk about in Georgian period home done by a famous architect. Paintings and moldings galore.

Walk back from Saltram along the coast path. Mostly an urban walk. QB feet still hurt.

Dinner at Thai Palace. Booby pushed QB into it. Took pushing and a lot of tiredness on QB's part. She was not impressed with the quality or taste of the food.

An enjoyable day, food notwithstanding.

Beer: John Smith bitter. From can. Rating: 3

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Arrival of Booby Hatch alleged rescue team. Forgot boots.

A guide noted that plymouth was sacked by Vikings until 997. Obviously, that info is incorrect since the Boog Sacking Team plus the Booby Hatch Subteam have arrived and are in full pillaging mode.

Visited a Dickensian shop advertising Liberty fabrics. Shop was crammed with apparel, bolts of fabric, notions of all shapes and sizes. The proprietor also made dresses and shirts of Liberty fabric in styles not seen since the 70s. This was not a problem as persistent inquiry showed that she preferred not to either show or sell them. Had to step over her cloth with a pained expression to even reach the racks.

Lido, old bath house of Plymouth, situated on a lovely place at the edge of the royal parade. Art work reminiscent of Botero.

Surprising dinner. Hakka. Food good but certainly not Hakka.

One photo is the Mayflower steps.

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Walk from Cawsands to Cremyll then ferry into Plymouth.

Nice muddy walk until HUGE downpour forced us into a gazebo. We were already soaked. Several diversions on the path due to cliff erosion. Mostly woodsy with views of the bay.

Upon crossing the Tamar river, by ferry, we leave Cornwall for Devon. End of the South West Coast Path part two!

Fourth floor walkup dump hotel. No luggage rack, no phone to call desk, no heated or not towel rack! We tried to pick the best hotel in Plymouth. Guess we are back in the real England now; a cultural shock after the service oriented Cornwall. Plymouth is Devon. On the positive side, since it only serves breakfast the hotel allows guests to bring food in and eat in the bar. We visited Marks & Spencer for smoked salmon, Camembert, and other goodies for a picnic dinner.

Wildlife Sighting: plaster sheep near Plymouth Guild Hall.

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Walk along west looe river.

Muddy trek along the river at low tide. Required several loud choruses of the Mud Song. Nevertheless, a break from the high cliffs.

Note: LETTUCE is a KILLER! Beware lettuce. A piece of ubiquitous, stupid Eurorocket tried to choke the QB at lunch yesterday. No more lettuce!

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Bus conversation among locals razzing the driver and trading gossip and dubious info among themselves: "you can use the senior pass in the whole country, but maybe not Scotland or Wales; but you can use it in Blackpool." Possibly the most entertaining bus ride ever.

Driver looked like a harrowed soul from a Tom Waits song. The exceedingly narrow lane taken by the bus is so lightly traveled there is moss growing down thwae middle.

Polperro is another ridiculously charming town built into the hillside with a fast running stream in front of the roadside cottages. The wind was howling up the harbor from the Channel.

Schlepped from Polperro to Looe along the path. At least it did not rain until we arrived. Looe is a busy little fishing port divided into East and West Looe by the river running through it. Had a tasty late lunch with fresh bread and tea.

Wildlife Sightings: grey squirrel (yesterday; unwanted by the Brits), egret stomping through mud.

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Did the Hall Walk along the estuary. Just like all the other up and down cliff walks except there was a lot more woodland in this region. Did include two ferry rides to cross the estuary to Polruan and at Bodminnick to return to Fowey.

Visited one of the top 1000 churches, Lanteglos, but not in the to 100. Better pic on flickr.

Great AbFab moment on way to dinner. Bright red Ferrari is parked in the middle of the Fowey main drag, which is barely one car width wide. The trunk is open and completely stuffed with cig cartons, paper bags and plastic bags. A middle age women is standing beside the car chatting about something and a young man is with her holding a plastic bag. Cars are beginning to pile up behind…

Chelsea buns for dessert.

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Eden project.

http://www.edenproject.com/whats-it-all-about

A somewhat Disney like experience but as a garden. Built in an abandoned China clay pit, transformed with 83000 tons of soil, landscaped, gardened etc. Project organized by the same person who did Heligan. A former musician clearly with many talents.

Outdoor trail with wonderful plantings and sculptures reminiscent of the Heligan gardens, with some overlapping artists.

Tropical Rainforest biodome best appreciated in the flickr pics. Malay village house, baobob drink, interesting discussion of how we get vanilla, panela (qb purchased some), I got a baobob smoothie drink, roul rouls, which are tropical partridges with iridescent feathers.

Mediterranean biome felt a lot like California and also displayed South Africa plant species, some familiar from our own gardens. Nice exhibit of pepper plants from sweet to insane. Each plant marked with its Scoville rating. The hottest appeared to be the Devon Naga at over 1.6 million.

Intended to walk back to the bus stop, a 45 or so minute stroll but when Boogs managed to instantly get lost upon leaving, a nice person said I will give you a lift. Took us all the way back to Fowey, showing us Tristan's grave on the way. Would not accept an offer of tea, or petrol money claiming had to get home to sick old cat. Cornwall can be amazing.

Bouillabaisse "for two" for dinner. Actually b for six. Burp.

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The (not so lost)Heligan Gardens

Cornish Yarg, quite mild tasty cheese bound in seaweed, for breakfast.

Veggies today: a veggie bake of unknown recipe, and, for QB, mulled cider with her sweet potato soup. Massive fruit scone.

The garden is an eighteenth century landscaped estate of diverse environments. Woodlands, jungle, carriage paths, formal gardens, flowers, and huge vegetable gardens, including a fairly unique manure heated pineapple greenhouse.

A big shout out to Yasmin for alerting us to this gem. There will be a number of garden shots, as well as of pigs the color of ginger biscuits on flickr. Not captured, bunny, partridge and some very loud but unseen squawking bird.

Beer: admiral's ale, also St. Austell,5%, darker than Doom. Almost as good.

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