the next morning we decided it was going to be our big sight-seeing day - we had only managed two stops on the coasts the day before before retiring with a few happy drinks with our fish and chip supper, but saturday was a new day. we had planned to cover a lot of ground, and head all the way down to land's end in penzance, but to break up the long drive (about an hour and a half from charlestown), we would hit up the much hyped st. ives for morning tea on the way.
the drive down was pretty easy, actually, and not as terrifying as the day before. the coastal roads are very narrow, and a lot of the time a sort of... one way system is in place, meaning whoever gets there first has right of way. that's just not how i like to play safe on the road, you know? we enjoyed very competitive games of 'horse' (literally yell out "horse!" whenever you see a horse), and then 'kiln' (same rules, just with kilns... we're a fun bunch, aint we?) as we drove the mainly-highwayed roads down to st. ives, before hitting the township just after 11am.
after navigating some terrifyingly narrow roads (that actually had a sign at the opposite end of where i'd driven in from saying "no cars permitted, extremely narrow road"... cheers, s. ives) just inside the town, we found a pay and display only a short walk from the centre of the town, so parked up and then made a mad dash for the nearest wetherspoons so us girls could desperately use the facilities.
keen for our first official cream tea of the trip, we wandered the cobbled streets until we found a particularly cute cafe called madeleine's that seemed to nail the brief. we popped into the mainly-empty cafe, took our seats, and looked over the menu. the girls were decided on cream tea, while mark was keen to stick to his tuna binge, and ordered a spud with the topping du jour. the young girl taking our orders was embarassed to have to let us know that they'd actually sold out of scones and would we like something else... having passed four or so bakeries with scones falling out the door, we were shocked this could even happen in cornwall, but decided we'd try our luck elsewhere.
we were suggested another cafe further up the bay called the tea rooms, so off we headed, in search of the perfect cream team. as we wandered along the waterfront, the sun started to peek it's funny yellow face out from behind the nonsense clouds, and threw a lovely new light (pun) on the town. the colours of the houses and boats in the water and shop fronts seemed to pop under the glow from the sky, and certainly plastered smiles on all of our faces. this was what we'd paid for. screw your hot and sunny days, we just wanted a bit of blue sky and sun while we were visiting these seaside gems.
we finally found the tea rooms, and waiting patiently (ha, no) at an outside table while an inside one became available, and then clambered for it with zero patience whatsoever. cream teas were ordered (and a tuna mayo for the male one), and nat even had the genius idea of ordered a cheese scone - for research, obvs, and my my... i've never tasted anything so delicious in my life. i mean, it's a certainty that scones taste better in their homeland, but... everything does. cornish butter, clotted cream, the fudges, ice creams... you name it, food has never tasted so good than on that weekend.
full to the brim on cornish cuisine, it was time to carry on. next stop: land's end.
