We had a lovely holiday this year along the North Coast of Cornwall at the very pretty Mother Ivy’s Bay. We were lucky with the weather and managed 3 lovely days on the beach visiting: Constantine Bay, Polzeath and Mother Ivy’s Bay. We spent a lot of time in Padstow which was the closest town for food (can’t seem to go to Cornwall without having some of Rick Steins posh fish & chips) and the days that were grey or rainy we headed inland for some sight seeing…

Lulu’s picture postcard moment: Wearing a jumper, bucket and a look that says: ‘Oi where’s my spade’.

Beautiful Boscastle – where I was drawn to these knitted Olympians that decorated the bridge (We all LOVED the Olympics)

Trerice House – One of the gorgeous National Trust properties we visited, though K and I both noted that there was no kitchen to look around and we do love to look around old kitchens. We also visited Lanhydrock which was massive in comparison (and had a huge kitchen), I’m going to do a separate post on it as I took A LOT of photos.

Bodmin Jail – I found this large old jail (I thought the English spelling was Gaol?) quite scary, you can walk around the old cells where they have reconstructed models of the innmates and their crimes. It is full of information about the history of punishments and how the prison system evolved, including the type of work that inmates were made to do and why. It was fascinating but dark and quite gloomy (as I suppose it would be) we were all fascinated and Lulu has been telling everyone since that we’ve been to prison which has raised some eyebrows! 

Port Isaac – I love Port Isaac, we visited twice during our stay. It’s a beautiful small fishing village, I was reading the autobiography of Port Isaac’s Fisherman’s Friends at the time and it was full of fantastic local tales which made the village seem more alive some how. We walked up the hill to look into Port Isaac Pottery and Rob suggested K and I should walk up further and take a look at Doc Martins house. I’ve never watched Doc Martin but when he suggested I take a photo of the house I thought why not, it was only when I got back down the hill and saw he was shaking his head at me that he informed me I’d been taking pictures of the wrong house!

It was definitely the best place to buy locally caught fresh crab – we couldn’t get enough of it.

Polzeath – for ice-creams and paddling, even when the weather turned grey and threatening the children wouldn’t keep out of the sea.

Then back to the bay each evening for some rock pooling and one last run about.

It’s always nice to come home after you’ve been away but now I’m looking back through the photos I think I’d quite like to be back there now.

Hope you are all enjoying the summer.

Bye for now. Em xx

♥