My mum and I decided to have a mini-break just us (first time I have left my children longer than one day in 9 years!). It was brilliant to have some quality time with my mum and planning a trip that includes all of mums favourite things. We stayed at the wonderful Mount Pleasant Holidays in Bodmin, which was a perfectly central place to take day trips from. Before arriving at our holiday accommodation we decided to visit the coastal town of Looe. Looe is particularly stunning as it is situated on either side of the River Looe. It has a bustling fishing harbour where we bought some freshly caught crab from Pengelly's to take back to our cottage to make a nice crab and chilli pasta. Looe also has a lovely little beach and some rocky outcrops to sit on, on the other side of the beach to sit and sea gaze.
The next day we took a trip to the Lost Gardens of Heligan. These Gardens became overgrown after World War 2 and were restored in 1990 to their former glory. It has now become Europes largest garden restoration. My favourite part of the Garden was the Jungle walk, massive plants, bursts of scents and colours and a rope bridge to take you across the canopy. The walled gardens and kitchen gardens are also a treat and you can eat from the kitchen and sample all the lovely produce grown here. That afternoon I took mum for a bit of a Poldark pilgrimage to Charlestown Harbour. Charlestown is a UNESCO World Heritage site, as is a very picturesque 18th Century port. There it houses old ships, cannons and you can even have a go at steering a Ship's Wheel, which adults enjoy as much as children. Charlestown is also famous for TV and film, more notably Poldark in recent times. There is also a fascinating shipwreck museum there, which treasures from various shipwrecks found off the coast of Britain. We had a lovely meal to end our day at the Rashleigh Arms, and the seafood as you would expect was delicious. We also had an amazing day in Padstow, but that is worth of a blog post of its own, so go back to the main menu to find this blog. Our last day and I treated mum to a Meerkats on the Moor experience, where you get to feed some rescued Meerkats, which is one of our favourite animals. This was a new venture for them, it was really nice to feed them and stroke them but I couldn't help feel that the enclosure was a little small for the experience. I hope they give them a bigger enclosure in the future!
On the way home we stopped at the Infamous Jamaica Inn, with its pirate history, for lunch, and to take a look around the Daphne du Maurier museum, which was a fascinating little site. I of course purchased a copy of Jamaica Inn and I am enthralled by the story Daphne has conjured up of this pub with its dark history and the brooding moor beyond.
