Today a family trip out to one of our favourites: Tintagel. Difficult to explain why, as I am not obsessed with Arthurian legend, and there is not much castle there really, but still the whole ruined castle stuck out on a crumbling cliff headland is quite appealing. It’s obvious how easy it would have been to defend as you have to struggle up steps cut into the cliff face to get to the top (believe me there were lots of stops to ‘check the view’ and gasp for breath!)
We took our son for the first time, a good home ed experience. He is very familiar with the ’sword in the stone’ story, and quite taken with the idea that this might have been Arthur’s birth place. Personally I doubt it - as there are many places in Britain that claim the same! - but legend is, as I explained to him, a mix of real history and fiction. Who knows what might be real.
These days they offer a landrover ride for a fee up and down the long hilly path to the castle.. good idea for the less able etc.. but we opted to puff back up the path, and rewarded ourselves with an icecream half way.. well it was organic Cornish icecream and it was irresistible to try the honey and lavender flavour!
I would recommend a trip to Tintagel to anyone visiting the area, although there is a lot of climbing steps involved. The village itself is.. amusing.. as everything seems to be touched with the Arthurian story.. we parked in the ’sword in the stone’ car park, looked in King Arthur’s bookstore.. had lunch at ‘the cross bow Inn’ etc… tacky, but harmless. May is a good time to go - not crowded.
Also in the village is ‘the old post office’ which is a lovely old building - now owned by the national trust, and shows medieval living set up, and a lovely cottage garden.
Back home to check on the animals and birds.. water the greenhouses, and all the pots hardening off.. running very low on collected water.. it’s been hot for several days now. Tired now..
We went to Tintagel when our youngest was about 5 months old and in the backpack. It was pouring with rain, (which he loved) so it wasn’t at all crowded and we had a lovely day. We did opt for the Land Rover drive back up the hill though. Now, aged 6, oldest still likes the rain - I’ll have to introduce him to some Arthurian stories and see if he likes those as well.
cool
Am impressed with anyone wishing to tackle all those steps in the rain !
If I remember correctly, it wasn’t raining when we started ….
We went there too about six years back on a ‘family’ holiday (the only time we have ever been away has a whole family was to a wedding and that was only over night) it is a lovely place.
A lifelesssimple - I wonder if we were there at the same time - was it raining when you visited?!!