Today we walked our longest and wettest walk ever! It was a lovely sunny morning in St Ives so after checking the bus timetable we decided to park at Sennen Cove, get the first bus to Lamorna at 11.13am and walk the 12 miles back. Even though I knew I was going on a lovely walk I wasn't that keen on the length of time it took us to get to the start of our walk. Firstly I had to go in the car to Sennen Cove and that took about 45 mins then I had to go on the bus for almost an hour. I'm ever so good on the bus but I still get very frightened when the bus opens its doors. They make a really loud whooshing noise and I hide behind Ann's legs. However I know that if I want to walk the South West Coast Path sometimes I must go on buses.The bus dropped us on the main road at about 12.10pm and we had to walk a mile down a little narrow road to Lamorna Cove to get to the start of our walk. That took us about 20 mins and I had to stay on my lead in case any cars came. It was a really pretty walk through woods and bluebells. The sun was shining and Ann had to take her fleece off.
When we got to the start of our walk I was allowed off my lead. In fact the only time on this walk when I had to go back on my lead was when we got to the Minnack Theatre and we had to walk through their car park and when we got back to Sennen Cove and we had to walk along the road back to the car park.
The start of our walk was lovely, the sea was turquoise, the sun was shining, the scenery was amazing and there were loads of other people and dogs about for me to talk to. I love meeting people when I'm out walking. Usually they tell me what a pretty girl I am. We had to climb over quite a few stiles today and we met a lady who asked Ann if she had to lift me over. Lift me over? What planet is she on? Just to prove how agile I am I jumped over straight away. The lady was ever so impressed. I also met a little girl who was crying because she didn't like dogs and I was following her along the path. She wanted her dad to pick her up but I decided to show her how lovely I am. I sat down and gave her my 'appealing look'. Ann told her dad I was friendly and liked children and the dad was really hostile and said, 'that's what they all say!' However the sister of the crying girl stroked me and once the other kid saw how gentle I was she stroked me as well. Then the dad actually said that his daughter had a real phobia of dogs and he thought if his daughter spent time with me she might overcome it. He asked Ann if he could borrow me. Fortunately I don't think he was being serious - I'm not going on loan to anyone?!
The first part of the walk was quite difficult. We had to clamber over loads of boulders and rocks and because there were so many people about we had to keep waiting for them to pass. The website guide said that this walk was moderate to strenuous. There was a lot of easy peasy sections but there was also a lot of up and down sections. I bet our legs will be sore by tomorrow.
Because we didn't start walking until after 12 noon Ann said we would have our lunch about 2pm-ish 'cos she thought that would be about half way through our walk. However at 2pm we couldn't find anywhere suitable to have our lunch and then it started to drizzle. Ann put on her anorak and then took it off again, put it on, took it off. This continued until we got to the Minnack Theatre at 3.10pm when it was actually raining quite hard and we still hadn't had our lunch!
After the Minnack Theatre we had to walk along loads of the coastal path that was really overgrown with nettles. Because it was raining we got very wet. I was absolutely soaked through by this stage, Ann's feet and legs were filthy, her shorts were soaked through, as was her anorak. Then we had to stop because she was worried that everything in her rucksack would get waterlogged and she wanted to put her phone and camera into one of my poo bags. That was OK with me because I'd had a big massive poo on the road down to Lamorna Cove which she was able to pick up and throw in a bin.
However, our walk from the Minnack Theatre onwards was not pleasant. It turned really foggy and misty and we couldn't see anything. Also there wasn't anyone else about. It was eerie and we were a bit scared. We could only see a few feet in front of us and we still had about 5 miles to go. At one stage the mist and rain stopped and for about half an hour and we dried out a bit. We also ate half of our sandwich but we didn't stop - we ate it on the go.
By the time we got to Lands End at 5.15pm the rain was quite heavy and the fog was even worse. We'd planned to take a lot of photos but there was no point. We couldn't see anything, the camera was in my poo bag and all we wanted to do at this stage was get to the end of the walk. When Ann saw the sign at Lands End that said that Sennen Cove was only a mile away she was so happy. We've done this part of the walk before so know it's not difficult. We got back to the car at about 5.50pm.
Ann towel dried me because I was absolutely drenched and I was also exhausted. I don't think I've ever in my life walked for almost 6 hours without stopping for a rest. There's been plenty of places for me to have a drink on this walk and on a few occasions the path has gone near the sea so I've been able to wallow in rock pools. Even though it's been raining it's also been hot today.
I've had a lovely day but I'm absolutely shattered now and am lying flaked out.
Tomorrow we were thinking of walking from Lamorna to Penzance but Ann says we have to check the weather forecast first. We were planning on getting the 9.35am bus from Penzance to Lamorna and walking back. Ann thought we'd be home by mid afternoon as we're meeting her friend Jane for a drink at 5pm. However we've walked for almost 6 hours without a rest today, Ann has recorded 30,071 steps on her pedometer, so we're actually thinking that we might have to rest tomorrow.
Even though I'm an exhausted little collie dog I'm loving our summer project of walking the South West Coast Path.
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