Lamorna Cove to Praa Sands

It's always disconcerting when after setting up your tent in a seemingly good wild-camping spot and you are about to drift off to sleep you hear some loud horse noises.

After a fretful night, where I dreamt a horse had sat on our tent; we packed up, tiptoed around the ponies, and back onto the path.

We passed Lamorna Cove just as it was getting light and were in Mousehole for a 9am breakfast. We could see the Lizard peninsula (Wednesday evenings destination) on the other side of the bay and it looked very, very, far away.

We continued along promenades to Newlyn passing a memorial for the Penlee lifeboat. In 1981 the lifeboat went to the aid of the Union Star vessel which had engine failure in heavy seas. After radioing in to say they had rescued 4 crew all communication was suddenly lost, know one knows what happened but there were no survivors. The 8 lifeboat crew were all locals from Mousehole so the community was hit very hard, the old lifeboat station has been left as a memorial.

We continued into Penzance, stopping to pick up some supplies from Sainsbury's on the way. We now know its a bad idea to go into larger supermarkets as you end up doing an extra kilometre traipsing around trying to find anything. We also know that high calorie dehydrated foods are tricky to buy so couscous it is again!

By the time we had finished wandering around Sainsbury's the sun had come out and we walked along the promenade avoiding the giant piles of seaweed deposited by storm Callum. You could see which cars hadn't been moved in a while, also it appears they are emptying the lido as I assume it's now full of seaweed and sand.

After zipping through Marazion and admiring St Michael's Mount we followed a collapsed cliff coast path diversion and headed back into more traditional paths; soon passing the village of Peranthonoe. After a quick feet break we did another 4 miles to Praa Sands which is where I have been on holiday annually with my family for probably 10 years. We grabbed some food in the Sandbar before continuing up the cliff to find a decent horse free wild camping spot. We both thought today was going to be a boring plod through towns and tarmac but it actually turned out to be a very scenic great day.

The Ruby Tiger Moth has 2 broods per year, we are seeing the second brood and the caterpillars will over winter before pupating in the spring.