Friday, July 15, 2016

First Rest Day

Padstow is a postcard pretty harbour town whose picturesque-ness is best appreciated before 9:00 a.m. and after about 7:00 p.m.



During the day throngs of visitors after pasties—not a misspelling of pastries, rather a Cornish empanada or calzone—crumbly fudge, as opposed to the smooth fudge in Devon (Lynn, you would love it all), fish, seafood, scones, cream teas, and ice cream. The ice cream is excellent. The BEST is Roskilly's, and I should know because I have sampled several.

There is a little lobster sort of museum where they do lobster research, which only makes sense, Everybody, you must read up on the life and doings of these crustaceans. Did you know, for example, that they shed their skeletons and grow new ones lots of times? And that they can live to 100 years and don't show signs of aging, but that does not explain why they die, does it? But wait, who ever heard of an arthritic prawn? Or of a whale with dementia? Back to the lobsters.....they are not necessarily "handed" in that which claw is the pincer and which the digger can change. And on it goes.

Not one to spend the day sitting around, I went on a bike ride for 3 1/2 hours on the famed Camel Trail. Very nice! But no photos, as I was on the bike the whole time.

On the way to the B and B some happy petunias




After the bike ride and the Roskilly's, I went a little crazy dealing with the phone. An agonizing "registering" experience preceded my trying to pay the absurd bill, but their on-line process would not let me pay, and the phone number you call to pay would not phone, and you have to have an automatic debit thing set up with them which you cannot do if you have a bill that needs paying, and you can't have an automatic debit set-up in any case if you do not have a bank account in England. Don't even ask how all this happened. All I wanted in the first place was to top off my SIM card. Maybe that is why I had a craving for peanut brittle tonight.

So after the bike ride, the ice cream and the phone, I visited the Prideaux Place, a private estate in Padstow. You were not allowed to take photos inside, which was too bad because there were many photo worthy rooms and fabulous objects within those rooms. You can only visit the home on a tour. Most fortunately the tour guide was very good, but I can never remember any of the historical stuff except that one heir to the place killed himself on the way to his father's funeral. Apparently, he did not want to take over the manse, which, at the time, was debt ridden. But who knows. The present Prideaux has a thing for teddy bears, and his wife has a thing for frogs, so there are lots of those in one form or another in some of the rooms. It was an hour and a half well spent.

Aside from the house, there were gardens. Think of a chunk of Central Park with a hint of Versailles and you get the picture. Really beautiful and peaceful.

This young man, seated in a corner, must have gotten a thorn in his foot:



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Padstow

1 comment:

  1. God Vicki , only you would do a bike ride on your so called rest day . !!

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