LEJOG Day 5: Carharrack to Come to Good

Weather: Brilliant sunshine and warm

Distance covered today: 10.7km ( 6.7 mi)

Last night's B&B: Benson's (£35)

% Complete: 4.6%

GPS satellite track of today's route: Day 5

Having talked about the tin and copper business yesterday, I intended to give it a break today, but I find myself just too interested to let go. At breakfast this morning, a particularly lazy one as I didn’t have far to walk today, I got talking to my hostess, Sue. She was a mine of information (sorry!) on the history of the tin and copper in the area.

The only reason I chose to go to Carharrack was because her B&B, (named after their dog, Benson) was conveniently placed. I had no idea that the three villages of Carharrack, Gwennap and Lanner were once the epicentre of the local mining industry.  According to a local publicity pamphlet, this area was widely known as the “richest square mile in the world” in the middle of the 19th century, (though one sometimes wonders how these things were measured).

Just imagine if I had been walking down the road and had similarly chanced upon this place 150 years ago.  I would have found myself in the midst of a crazy mining boom, comparable to those in Johannesburg, Kimberley and California. I might have become “Kevin, the tin magnate” or “Kevin, the copper baron”.  On the other hand, knowing my track record I probably would have bought in just as the market crashed. Which it did spectacularly in Carharrack! Unlike the ores in Camborne and Redruth, where they discovered tin under the copper, there was no such luck at Carharrack and the decline was sudden and complete as the bottom did indeed fall out of the copper market through immense over-supply.  The entire industry died in a very short time and the population declined precipitously.

The atmospheric names remain. There are signs pointing to places such as “The Great Flat Lode” and “Wheal Jane”.  Even the villages have entertaining names such as Sunny Corner, Coldwind and Little Beside. The village I am staying in tonight rejoices in the name of “Come to Good”, which I suspect has more to do with a very old, local, Quaker meeting hall than a sense of having struck it rich underground!

Yet the local environment is still paying the price. My route today enabled me to return to the bridle paths and the tracks, and hence to avoid the “B” roads. The paths in this part of Cornwall are much improved, possibly as a result of the greater population of both people and horses. In any case, I travelled off the metalled way for much of the day, and then suddenly, I found myself in the “Bissoe Valley Nature Reserve”. This peculiar little park runs along the Carnon River and thereby hangs a tale.

The river itself looks peculiar with very red banks and bottoms and remarkably clean water flowing through it.  Eventually a noticeboard informed me that there had been an environmental disaster when the waters from a disused mine had suddenly flooded the local area and poisoned the environment all the way to the sea. A major reclamation project was established and ran until the environment was restored. To this day a much reduced operation is permanently in operation, paid for by the Dept. of the Environment (i.e. the taxpayer), draining the mines, cleaning the water and sending it off to the sea. The area covered by the initial reclamation project has now been given to the nation as this nature reserve.  Hence the clean water over the red soil!

I am currently sitting in a perfectly delightful pub for my evening meal, a mile or two from Come to Good, called the Punchbowl and Ladle which has been here since the 15th Century and eventually served the trade headed towards The King Harry Ferry over the Fal River. This is good because I need to use the ferry tomorrow to get to my next port of call, and the alternative, I am informed is a 27 mile detour, something which is well beyond me!

Before I left home, I phoned to find out if the Ferry was operating at this time of year. Time and again, there was no answer. I decided to take a chance!  It turns out that this particular ferry is rated amongst the 8 most celebrated ferries in the world and has been operating every twenty minutes with incredible reliability for centuries.

I needn’t have worried!

 These mining/industrial skeletons continued to dominate the landscape

Today, I took to the bridal paths and trails, and the result was hugely satisfying

 

You wouldn't, by any chance, just possibly, have some Polos on you, would you?

The very first bluebell of my spring!

The river in the Bissoe Valley Nature Reserve. The sign said "Don't touch the water!"