Our St. Ives hotel was high on a hill above the city. The view was great but it was quite a cardio workout walking up. Some of our group chose to use the local taxi services. St. Ives affords some nice scenery but is also quite touristy.
A fun event was a visit to a bakery in Portreath where we all made a pasty, which would be our lunch! Since Barb and I have been involved with making Cornish pasties before, this proved to be quite interesting. We were pleased that the way we make them at our church is quite traditional, to the extent we can without commercial equipment.
We then visited the Geevor tin mine. The mine was closed in 1990 when government subsidies were stopped by prime minister Margaret Thatcher. This mine has been turned into a museum. The depth (2100 feet) and extent of mine shafts was a surprise.
Our next adventure was to conquer St. Michael’s Mount, a rock island that has been inhabited for 1500 years. The tide was out when we arrived so we could walk to the mount on a causeway. During our visit the tide came in so we had to return to the mainland via boat. The climb up to the castle on top was again a cardio workout but the views were well worth it.
Enroute to our final tour stop in the city of Bath we stopped at Tintagel Castle, the purported home of King Arthur. Whether King Arthur actually existed or not, Tintagel Castle affords great views.
Our final tour stop was Bath. We took very few photos here having vistied it on a previous UK trip. Barb and I departed for London at the end of the tour to begin the next part of our UK adventure.
