Figgy Dowdy’s Well – Carn Marth

Figgy Dowdy had a well On top of Carn Marth hill She locked it up night and day Lest people carry the water away! Carn Marth is the highest of a range of hills that stretch from Gwennap to Camborne. Rising 757ft (230m) above the village of Lanner, it is riddled with quarries and old […]

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The Ruin of Merther Church

Old buildings, I feel, always have a certain presence but ruined places somehow even more so.  There is a special kind of mystery in a ruined place and I find myself drawn in and pisky-led.  My rather over-active imagination can fill these ivy-clad, tumble-down spaces with life and lives that are entirely of my own invention.  Maybe […]

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In Launceston, Throwing Stones at Mary Magdalene

Living as I do in Mid Cornwall sometimes it can feel that I am a long way from anywhere in either direction. If I take a trip ‘down west’ then I like to make a day of it and take a picnic. And the same must be said for the other direction too. There would […]

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The Centre of Cornwall & a rather Mysterious Tail

Everything has a beginning, a middle and an end.  The Tamar river in many ways marks the beginning of Cornwall. And of course we all know where to find the End. It is the village of Lanivet, not far from Bodmin, that marks the middle.You see this little place’s claim to fame is that it is meant […]

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Saint Keyne – Equal Rights for 5th Century Women

saint keyne

We often think of saints as somehow ethereal beings who did miraculous, unbelievable things in far-away lands and in times so distant from our own.  And let’s face it some of them very much live up to that reputation.  But we shouldn’t forget that they were actually real people. The Real Saint Keyne Saint Keyne […]

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