From Saltash
We went canoeing from Weir Quay the other day, but the light was not very good for taking photos. There's a nice slipway and it's not too muddy. We saw some egrets. That's about it really.
Then today we went to Saltash, which was a bit daring of us: so far we have only gone out on the upper river, but Saltash is very nearly the seaside, down where there are speedboats and warships. The seaside bit means that you can launch at low tide without getting completely covered in mud, but sharing the water with so many other watercraft is a little alarming.
Pp looking very intrepid, about to set off:
It was hard work paddling out against the wind and the tide, so I didn't take any photos until we had rounded the corner of the Saltash shoreline into the wide mouth of the River Lynher. So, no photo of the seal we saw catching fish, or of the jellyfish. You can just see in the photo below that we had come into calmer water, sheltered from the wind. We went on past that boat, which had a bicycle on it. A chap came out and exchanged barely-audible greetings with us: he had a definite air of being in permanent residence. Lovely place to live at this time of year.
We fled the wind and paddled off up Forder Creek, under the viaduct that carries the main railwayline into Cornwall. That's Trematon Castle on the hill behind, where Sir Francis Drake reportedly stashed his ill-gotten treasure.
We had intended to go further up the Lynher, but the headwind was a bit too much for us, so we turned back into the Tamar and back towards Brunel's Tamar Bridge, which also carries the railway into Cornwall. As Pp said, it's not surprising it took them a while to bring the railway into Cornwall, they had to build so. many. viaducts...
Speaking of which, we took a detour on the way back and dipped into this creek under, yes, yet another railway viaduct. A couple were having a little bonfire on the bank here. We were a bit too far away to see if they were cooking something or if it was just a random fire, but if they had been fishing, they would have had lots of choice. The creek was humming with fishes here. No wonder the seal was hanging about.
When we got back to the beach, it was not quite high tide, so we decided to nip across the Tamar and explore along the Devon side a little. No photos of us crossing the river, because it was a bit alarming crossing, with all the yachts and motorboats coming and going. We adopted a strategy of lurking behind a moored boat until there was a gap, then making a dash for it across the channel.
It must have worked, because here is some Devon. I photographed this particularly because I was impressed with the laundry hoisted high on pulleys, which is not something you see much nowadays.
Looking back across the river, we could see the Cornish Cross up on the hillside. Pp considers this in some obscure way to belong to him, because he did some vital paperwork for it.
And back to the shore, to find a terrifying waiting committee of swans (they can break your arm, you know!)
But we escaped the swans with our arms unbroken, and went home, feeling somewhat stiff and salty.
Then today we went to Saltash, which was a bit daring of us: so far we have only gone out on the upper river, but Saltash is very nearly the seaside, down where there are speedboats and warships. The seaside bit means that you can launch at low tide without getting completely covered in mud, but sharing the water with so many other watercraft is a little alarming.
Pp looking very intrepid, about to set off:
It was hard work paddling out against the wind and the tide, so I didn't take any photos until we had rounded the corner of the Saltash shoreline into the wide mouth of the River Lynher. So, no photo of the seal we saw catching fish, or of the jellyfish. You can just see in the photo below that we had come into calmer water, sheltered from the wind. We went on past that boat, which had a bicycle on it. A chap came out and exchanged barely-audible greetings with us: he had a definite air of being in permanent residence. Lovely place to live at this time of year.
We fled the wind and paddled off up Forder Creek, under the viaduct that carries the main railwayline into Cornwall. That's Trematon Castle on the hill behind, where Sir Francis Drake reportedly stashed his ill-gotten treasure.
We had intended to go further up the Lynher, but the headwind was a bit too much for us, so we turned back into the Tamar and back towards Brunel's Tamar Bridge, which also carries the railway into Cornwall. As Pp said, it's not surprising it took them a while to bring the railway into Cornwall, they had to build so. many. viaducts...
Speaking of which, we took a detour on the way back and dipped into this creek under, yes, yet another railway viaduct. A couple were having a little bonfire on the bank here. We were a bit too far away to see if they were cooking something or if it was just a random fire, but if they had been fishing, they would have had lots of choice. The creek was humming with fishes here. No wonder the seal was hanging about.
When we got back to the beach, it was not quite high tide, so we decided to nip across the Tamar and explore along the Devon side a little. No photos of us crossing the river, because it was a bit alarming crossing, with all the yachts and motorboats coming and going. We adopted a strategy of lurking behind a moored boat until there was a gap, then making a dash for it across the channel.
It must have worked, because here is some Devon. I photographed this particularly because I was impressed with the laundry hoisted high on pulleys, which is not something you see much nowadays.
Looking back across the river, we could see the Cornish Cross up on the hillside. Pp considers this in some obscure way to belong to him, because he did some vital paperwork for it.
And back to the shore, to find a terrifying waiting committee of swans (they can break your arm, you know!)
But we escaped the swans with our arms unbroken, and went home, feeling somewhat stiff and salty.