DAY 2

Time, Accidents and U Turns 

This morning our Time Lord threw us a curved ball by being a full ten minutes early for the allocated breakfast slot. As we ate breakfast at exactly 0840 Bowie requested a departure time, our initial suggested time of 0837 was rejected as was 0859. We finally settled on 0901, at precisely 0911 Bowie was ready to depart thus restoring the time equilibrium in his chronometer orientated mind.

On the trio set deliberately to repay Bowie the wrong way for ten metres down a one way street. 

Our first stop was in No Man’s Land a Cornish village to photograph a village sign post. Excitedly Monkey pointed at an assembly of road traffic signs, Dee seeing Monkeys target kicked down Buttercups side stand and jumped off to photograph. Totally ignoring the slight incline and without the benefit of his hearing aids he happily snapped away. Meanwhile Buttercup moved forward and fell over, Monkey carefully righted her whilst verbally abusing Dee. With this in mid Dee decided it to be inappropriate to commit Monkey to the Monkey Sanctuary as advertised on the brown highway sign.

Onwards to our first ferry at Bodinnick and across the estuary. 

Regular blog readers will recall that on leg two Monkeynav took us down a long ago abandoned medieval goat track. Not wishing this to be an isolated matter Monkeynav’s programmer pushed the boat out on leg three. Todays byways at times near vertical, were a maximum of eight foot wide, bounded by tall steep grass banks. In between a surface of lightly broken macadam was quaintly centrally separated by a pretty grassed area and the entire surface liberally coated in equine deposits and loose gravel. 

After a particularly arduous pedestrian rate category one assent and once the byway levelled out Monkey decided what was needed to lighten the moment was an impromptu display of his Cubs riding and handling skills. Here the account of what actually happened needs to be that of a majority of those present, namely Bowie and Dee who were following. Monkey’s claim of it was all perfectly in my control is, shall we say vehemently denied by firsthand witnesses. In a nutshell Monkey deliberately went off road, if you can call these surfaces roads, tackling the grass bank on Daisy a major wobble occurred,  really a grass track tank slapper occurred and with both feet off the foot rests he wrestled and wobbled Daisy back to more suitable mediums. Disappointingly remaining by the skin of his teeth upright and sadly negating what would have been unquestionably the Kodak moment of the day.

Onwards to the second ferry crossing of the day the King Harry crossing then upwards to Lizard point the UK’s southern most point. Sadly to achieve this we had to ride past Culdrose RNAS base which was adorned with various old aircraft. With great thanks Dee and Bowie breathed a great sigh of relief as the base was passed as no Sea Harrier was present in the historical display. Thus saving them at least 20 minutes of Monkeys eyewitness account again of such an aircraft’s demise off the Lowestoft beach.

Arriving at Lizard point at 1430 the trio dined on rather nice sandwiches with eye watering price tags. Refreshed and refuelled the trio remounted and headed Land’s End way. Arriving at the car park Monkey surreptitiously led us to a point closest to the iconic sign post where a sign stated no vehicles beyond this point. Dee set off on foot to investigate, returning to advise the absence of a prefect or other such guardian. At this point captain pedantic put his foot down, Bowie stated there’s a prohibition sign there, it’s there for a reason, crestfallen the trio set off on foot. Dee loitered with a fag and at the appropriate moment doubled back for Buttercup, arriving at the sign as Monkey acted as chief photographer for tourists. A quick dismount and some Kodak seconds recorded Buttercup and the boys at the U turn point.

Onwards the trio pressed, towards the nights accommodation at The Timmers Arms in the village of Zennor Cornwall. 

On route Bowie honed his recently acquired skill as a small car magnate with another vehicle taking a lunge at him out of a junction. By subtle blend of skill and blind panic closely avoiding an impromptu dismount, no wing mirrors were harmed in this incident as Dee was ahead of the critical situation.

Refreshment, food and beds now the order of the evening with 148 miles covered today.