Page 41 - recollections of a life in Porthleven
P. 41
opportunity to eat a bun or being given a slice of heavy cake straight from
the oven, which tasted so delicious.
Anyway after a very tasty roast dinner, and after all the dishes and pots and
pans were put away. Margaret and I would be changed into clean clothes
and we would go out for an afternoon walk with our Father. Stephen didn't
go with us for a few years because of his age, but he did join us when he got
older.
Our walks would be in different directions depending on the time of year
and of course the weather. On a particular walk we went straight down to
the beach. Our home, Trewarvas, overlooked the beach, with just few
seconds we would be on the beach. Dad would start the fun as soon as we
got onto the beach. He would walk off in front of us encouraging us to look
for dropped money from holiday makers. After a while dad would call us to
him. He would have moved some sand around with his foot and he would
encourage to look through the sand he had moved around, and sure enough
Margaret and myself would fine a three penny piece each.
As we walked along the beach pass blue boy and on pass Tye Rock we would
spend a lot of the time trying to skim flat stones in the sea, also getting wet
feet I am sure. Just after passing Tye rock we would climb a few rocks and
then climb an iron ladder up to an area which was called the ‘first downs’.
There we would have some fun trying to climb the rocket pole, a pole roughly
the size in diameter of a telephone pole, but only about 25 feet in height and
painted white. If I can recall it was used as a nautical mile post with the light
on Porthleven pear in line with the light at the back of the steps at Bay View.
The idea was you could work out a speed of a boat between the two points.
Needless to say we never climbed the rocket pole even with the help of our
father.
On from the first downs we would walk on a very rough road until we got
onto the second downs. We were told not to run off and be very quiet because
if we did what we were told we might just see a rabbit. Thinking about it
now it was Dad's way of keeping us under control and safe. We could have
run off and fell over the cliff and end on the beach a number of feet below.