We were up and away to get the bus to Penzance, and what a journey this turned out to be. Picture double decker buses in narrow Cornwall roads and overhanging tree branches en route. The drivers must have the patience of Job trying to squeeze past other vehicles. At times they are inches and I mean inches from houses, and whilst this could be considered normal for the area the most alarming thing is the damage done to the top sides of these buses. The drivers do their best but the trees pelt the buses with some hefty bangs and you would not believe the damage to the top front corners and sides of these buses…..

We arrived in Penzance and looked around the harbour spotting some boats that had left the Isles of Scilly the same day as us heading for Falmouth, but they must have decided to stop here and get back to work, or this was a far as they wanted to go given the forecast! It was pretty congested in the harbour, which has a lock gate that is only open for a certain period of time before and after high water. This gate allows all the boats within the harbour to float all the time, with the other part of the harbour complex drying out completely. No offence to anyone, but this area could not be described as pretty, and we were pleased that we didn’t come into here en route.

Interestingly we found out that the ferry that runs from here to the Isles of Scilly (the Scillionian) which, after the gig racing was packed with gigs and people, couldn’t get into the harbour due to the bad weather and had to shelter behind St Michaels Mount until the weather settled itself. Thank goodness we left when we we did!

We then decided to walk round to Newlyn to see if it was any better, but in truth found this also to be a pretty tired looking place, and the harbour had hardly any space available for any visiting boats. Both places could really do with a bit of a hoover! One good thing we found was Dukes Cafe, just across from the War Memorial that served lovely food at reasonable prices. For the record, I normally love working harbours, but there is simply something missing in these ports. I can say that we were both pretty disappointed, as we had been looking forward so much to visiting them – shame really.

In fairness we didn’t see either of these ports/towns at their best, as the weather was a bit wet and miserable. Whilst we were glad we came down to look at these ports, the overwhelming feeling was of being pleased that we had decided to continue directly to Falmouth. It was then a case of walking back to Penzance and another “bus bashing” trip back to Falmouth.

Back in the marina we had a good chat with the South African crew who are in the process of delivering a Leopard 46 Catamaran from South Africa to Sweden. They had an interesting story to tell as they got a bit of a bashing coming up the Atlantic and had to heave to for three or four days before heading into the Azores for some repairs to the rigging. We were invited on board to have a look around and all we can say is wow – it is simply enormous inside. The luxury staterooms are huge, one of which is about the size of Sun Dog. Unfortunately for them, they are so far behind on this delivery trip, and this has been compounded by having to shelter here, but they hope to head off within the next couple of days, and we wish them the best of luck.