Cornwall – The Lion Voyager

Inspiration

TRAVEL GUIDE - Cornwall

TheLionVoyager

We travelled all around cornwall for 15 days and discovered fantastic places

Arrive by car or by train from London?

Cornwall is the extreme south-western peninsula of England, it’s one of the most beautiful places to visit in the country. To have the chance and enjoy every corner of the peninsula, you will need a car, would be hard to go around without it. Departing from London you have two options, you can drive, it takes between five and six hours to get from London to the end of Cornwall by car, or you jump on a train. There are daily departures from Paddington station to Truro, the journey will take around 6 hours, once in Truro you can hire a car in the station.
Cornwall is one of the UK’s favourite summer destinations, due to the high volume of traffic on roads during the summer months, travelling to Cornwall overnight or outside peak hours is recommended to avoid delays. I love this part of UK, it remind me a lot of some part of Australia, it has dramatic coastlines, beautiful huge sandy beaches, pretty harbour villages and you can walk for hours along the coastal paths. Don’t forget that Cornwall has some of the most beautiful beaches of the country, the colour of the water is fantastic if you think that you are in the north of Europe, my favourite ones are Portheras Cove and Pedn Vounder Beach.

Exploring Portheras Cove

A hidden gem, still not very well known by tourists. Portheras Cove is one of my top suggestions of places to visit in West Cornwall. It’s set between Pendeen and Morvah, on the coastline between Lands End and St Ives.
A real ‘locals’ beach, it’s not the easiest beach to find, the cove is sandy and located at the end of a small valley and if you are lucky seals are a common sight here.
We parked just next the white lighthouse of Pendeen, for then following the road to a lower small car park. From here there is a gate that opens on to the cliffs and you need to take the path on the right, it’s a fantastic scenic walk down to this beach, you will stop often as the view of the cove is unbelievable.
The colour of the water is so bright, it’s really a perfect place for a relaxing day in a beautiful location.

Port Isaac

Carnewas at Bedruthan Steps

“Why visit Cornwall?
Cornwall Needs No Reason, Cornwall Is Its Own Reason.”

Carnewas at Bedruthan Steps & Poly Joke Beach path

Carnewas and Bedruthan Steps is another of my favourite places to visit! Located in North Cornwall it’s an absolute must-see spot, the views are fantastic.
The full walk will take you around 1.5-2 hours, the landscape over Bedruthan Steps is awesome. There are 149 steps down to the beach. Try to go when the tide is low, there is a large stretch of sandy beach, beautiful clear water, and lots to explore.
Just 30 minutes south of Bedruthan Steps, there is another fantastic walk to do, starting from Poly Joke Beach to Holywell Bay Beach, absolutely wonderful beaches to visit and along the path the landscape is fantastic.

Amazing things you should know about Cornwall

01.

shop in the local farms

Cornwall is home to some of the best food producers and local farmers of the country, they might be slightly more expensive then a normal shop, but it's worth it.

02.

Discover Cornwall by Kayak

One of the best ways of getting really close to nature and away from the crowds is to explore the coast, hidden beaches and rivers of Cornwall in a canoe or kayak.

03.

Taste the "real" Cornish pasties

A delicious local dish, perfect for a snack at the beach, you can find it in every town in every bakery.

Pedn Vounder Beach

Newquay

Where to stay?

In our last visit in July 2020, we have spent 15 days exploring this peninsula. The first week we were based 10 minutes outside of Tintagel in a town called Tregatta, on the north Atlantic coast. While the second week we moved south to Penzance. The first week we had the opportunity to visit beautiful harbour villages such as Port Isaac, Padstow, Constantine Bay, Newquay, Fowey, and we explored so many paths on the north part of Cornwall. Moving south the second week, it gave as the chance to don’t waste too much time driving, based in Penzace every place that we were visiting was around 30 mins away. The best place to visit in this area are Land’s End, Porthcurno, Minack Theatre, Mousehole, St Michael’s Mount, Kynance Cove, Lizard Point, and Saint Ives. Living in London, we wanted to stay somewhere quiet and we loved to stay in beautiful cottages in the countryside overlooking the sea. So depending on what you are looking for, you can choose your accommodation. In the south of Cornwall you can find everything, nice towns to explore, beautiful paths for long walks and stunning beaches, while in the north the beaches are not amazing like in the south.

Saint Ives & Penzance

Those two towns are located on the southern area of Cornwall and they are surrounded by loads of natural beauties and beautiful little towns. St Ives is perhaps known as one of the most popular destinations in Cornwall and it gets very busy in summer time. In this area you will find one of the most beautiful roads to drive of all Cornwall, with breath-taking landscape, from St Ives to Land’s End, and you will stop so many times in places like Zennor, Portheras Cove, Trewellard, and Sennen Cove, it’s really worth to spend a day just in this area.
Other amazing places to visit that we loved are Porthcurno, the Minack Theatre, Mousehole, St Michael’s Mount, all of them are very close to Penzance.
One of the most interesting landmarks to visit in the area in my opinion is St Michael’s Mount (the smaller version of Le Mont-Saint-Michel in Saint-Malo), we didn’t get to visit the castle and gardens as it was all sold out, but the walk across the path was stunning. The island can be accessed by foot across the causeway at low tide, or by short ferry crossing at high tide, it has stunning panoramic views across Mounts Bay.
Other two fantastic places with incredible panoramic views are Land’s End (the most westerly point of mainland Cornwall and England) and the Lizard Peninsula that has picturesque landscape and coastline, and here you will find one of the most visited Cove of Cornwall, Kynance Cove.