Tuesday 10 February 2009

Site Cleared At Boat Cove

The shed and slip at Boat Cove have now been removed marking the end of an era for what was once a much needed facility.

After no solution could be found to extend the life of this amenity Ian Hicks was left with the unenviable task of removing both the shed and the slip.

Although the lease had been passed back to the National Trust Ian was still in the frame for clearing the site.

Ian said:

" I was able to save some money by enlisting the help of my son-in-law with his tractor and his ability with a digger, but it was very hard work at least 3-4 days .

The cost of Recycling is huge the last trailer load, with bagged up asbestos, metal and plastic was nearly £300, there were 4 other loads of wood and Ivy that I hope will come in a lot cheaper, so the quote we were given by the Trust of just under £2,000 all done was fair value".









So there we have it, the end of Boat Cove as we knew it. All life changes, whether we like the changes or not is another thing.

The Trust would like to point out they are still very keen to have your comments, ideas and opinions about Boat Cove and its future, particularly regarding the use of the cove by boat owners, and access to the beach. You can contact Julie Hanson, Warden for Godolphin and Mount's Bay on 01736 762479 or Julie.Hanson@nationaltrust.org.uk

Photos courtesy of Ian Hicks

Monday 9 February 2009

Community Event Was A Huge Success

Perranuthnoe really came together for the community consultation event held last Friday in the Church room.

Over 70 villagers, young and elderly, wrapped up and turned out to have their say on the future of the Perranuthnoe Church Room. Doors opened at 3pm and new faces arrived every five minutes right through until close of play at 7pm.

Local volunteer, Annie Henry invited people to sign-in, gave every person some colour-coded voting stickers and then the hard work began!

People were guided around the consultation panels by local residents Michael Ball, Des Astin, Frank Tanner, Parish Cllr. Pippa Young and Doug Polman of West Cornwall Community Network. Experts such as local Builder Mike Berris and Energy Advisor Rob Pickering from Community Energy Plus were on hand to help answer questions as they arose. Residents were rewarded for their hard work with tea and coffee laid on by Pam, Marion, Diana, Pat and Barbara.

Katie Kirk, Community Facilitator said;

"This was by far the most positive consultation event I’ve ever been to. I was really pleased that people took the process seriously and gave careful thought to the questions we were asking. We’ve been given some great ideas to take the project forward and some enthusiastic offers of practical help too. The next stage is to liaise with professionals to see which ideas are feasible and can be accommodated".

Residents were asked to help identify the main problems with the existing Church Room and to generate ideas for new activities. Solutions ranged from the tiny ‘hook for coats & bags in toilets please’ to the radical ‘extend two storey’. The number-crunching is still taking place but it is already clear that local people would like to see some kind of shelter at the front of the building, better access, improved toilets, storage and solutions to the over-crowded kitchen during the famous Summer Teas.

There were many new ideas for activities at the hall including a book club, play readings and film nights. The most popular ideas spanned the age-groups such as art classes, computer classes and some kind of exercise or relaxation group.

17 young people came and showed a particular interest in using the room for music activities (instrument lessons, rehearsal space, village choir), games nights, a poetry group, pet-care and animal charity fund-raising. Each young person went away with a highly prized ‘Clanger’ badge supplied by Libby Pentreath from Lescudjack Childrens’ Centre.

Michael Ball said;

"We would like to thank everyone who turned out to the event on such a cold afternoon. It was nice to see new and familiar faces and we are grateful to people who travelled in from outlying areas such as Trebarvah lane and other neighbouring settlements. Thanks to everyone who helped us to publicise the event".

If anyone has any other ideas for the Church Room, please send them to Katie Kirk at the Old Bakehouse or leave suggestions at the Victoria Inn, Perran Crafts, village Church or in the comments section below by this Saturday 14th February.


























Photos courtesy Michael Ball and Annie Henry.
Submitted by Katie Kirk.

Letter From Llyn Evans

Dear Friends in Perranuthnoe

Congratulations on what sounds like a Red-Letter Day for the Church Room. Mike and Meg have sent me interesting accounts of that day of planning, with high praise for Katie and Annie. Mike sent me pictures too, and I must say it brought happy tears to my eyes to see the dear faces of old friends in a much-loved place, doing such a worthwhile job. The best of luck with your application – it deserves every success. It is this spirit and enthusiasm, as well as the expertise, that is the heartthrob of the village. Your ideas sound so exciting: I’d be throwing my all into the play readings, the poetry and the music! AND the computer technology – I could do with that here.
My word, you are having a winter to remember – and to think I’m missing it…. If there’s still any whiteness left, please throw a snowball for me at Boat Cove.

Here under the eye of the Himalayas, I look at the mountains as I breakfast outside of a morning and feel blessed by a different beauty. ‘Winter’ officially ended on 22 January, but it still feels cold at night and in the early morning. There is usually morning fog too, and in the quiet of the breakfast table one of my delights is to watch the feathery skeletons of trees appear as the fog becomes veil-thin and then the lemon globe of the sun shines through. I always hope to see the green parrots emerge from their holes in the trees, no doubt to say ‘What’s for breakfast?’ in Hindi. One day I’d like to answer them in their mother tongue: ‘A banana and porridge, with toast and tea.’ Sometimes there is a spicy rice dish, which is Very Good For You, but which I wimpishly avoid in favour of cornflakes. Toast and cornflakes are a considerate gesture for Western guests.

In some ways life here away from the cities has the charms of another age: slow pace; plenty of time to talk and take an interest in everyone you meet; people skilled in one craft, so that you buy something handmade that has long been mass-produced in England; people making a living in simple ways. The other day I heard someone chanting down the road long before I saw him: it sounded like a temple version of our rag-and-bone man. When he came into sight he was a man on a push-bike, wearing a suit of armour-coloured padlocks. If you wanted a lock that day he would unclip one from his chest. Another time, when we needed to have a library key cut for me, a Sikh came on his motorbike with a bag of fine tools, and he cut it by hand outside the library door. Such craftsmanship! It was a pleasure to watch: it took him 20 minutes; it was as if he saw the shape of the key in the block of metal, and chipped away what was not needed, like Michelangelo.

The street outside the ashram is called ‘the village’; everyone knows everyone else – rather like Perranuthnoe really, except that there are lots of little shops in small dark buildings. They may look like sheds, but what would we give in Perranuthnoe to have their facilities to hand! They sell sweets and biscuits and soap and notebooks, pens and aspirins, rice and flour, coconut and cough mixture. (Come to think of it, Village Crafts covers most of these, and of course more.) Sitting outside, a carpenter makes furniture, a tailor will mend your clothes, there is a water-pump and a stall where a boy presses sugar-cane for its sweet juice by turning an iron version of the wheel, a cross between a trouser-press and a spaghetti-maker.

And yet in other ways India has leapt into the 21st century. Look at the way I am able to use a little magic box on my lap here, knowing that this letter will reach you tonight. Snail-mail stamps may not have glue on them, though snails do, but the Internet makes contact with the world possible, so that it seems that I am the only person here who uses stamps. Even my students say ‘Nobody writes letters these days.’ I think that’s a pity, and I would love to receive letters from you.

The ashram–college here is run very efficiently – but it would grind to a halt without mobile phones. I am the odd one out again without one. Swami Veda, the Head, not so active these days, is able to keep his finger on the pulse of the ashram by Blackberry. All this technology in a place that draws its inspiration from antiquity. The yogis contemplated the heavens and the stars and human nature and the divine from their caves high in the mountains. They knew the interaction of mind and body, they taught control of the mind, they told us we are waves in the ocean - but not the ocean.

I am well blessed in living here with people who are carrying on that priceless heritage. I was quite ignorant before I came, so that I learn something new and mind-stirring every day.

January 26th was Republic Day. At 8 a.m. Flag Ceremonies were held over throughout India. When I think of the whole of India celebrating something together, I have to remind myself that this means 1.15 billion people!

Everybody in the ashram assembled outside, all the students in white, except for the orange-robed swamis among them. Swami Veda, the Swami of Swamis, was brought to us in a wheelchair, and it was touching to see one of the children rushing up to him with a hug and an orange hat. The flag was at the top of the pole, bunched up like a little bag. When Swami Veda gave a slight tug, the flag-bag unfurled, releasing a shower of rose-petals on him. He is a historian, and gave us a brief history of the events leading to Independence in 1947, the role of Mahatma Gandhi, and the launching of the Constitution on January 26th 1950.

My photos with this letter have had their captions removed by the Computer Trickster, but I’m hoping you will see some of the Flag Ceremony, and the rose petals that I had seen collected the day before (without knowing why), and some mountain scenes when we followed the course of the river Ganga to where it begins to be Ganga at the confluence of two rivers, a dramatic healing place, one of the most powerful in the land. People were jumping into the water, and there was a cave for ladies to change their saris for dry ones. Because of the contrast in the two rivers: one boisterous and turbulent, the other still and serene, I could have stayed there all day.

It will soon be time for a walk by the Ganga here in full moonlight. Swami Veda gives a global Full Moon Meditation every month, at 4 different times so that 4 time-zones are covered. Ours was in his presence at 7 this morning.

You’ll soon be enjoying the incomparable wonder of all your Spring flowers. I’ll be remembering them and you.

Love and blessings to you all, Llyn.







Submitted by Llyn Evans - India

All Clear At Boat Cove

Well the site is clear at Boat Cove at last. I informed Julie Hanson last night by email, and asked her to inspect it and sign me off.

Still more people who take no notice of signage, given that yesterday was so wet the mud so sticky, it was like a swamp in places, some still came through or tried to, perhaps it shows an Independent Spirit and one that hates Health and Safety Rules , in truth I think that probably applies to lots of us. Pity we still find ourselves in the E. U. then ?

Best regards,
Ian


Submitted by Ian Hicks

Friday 6 February 2009

Boat Cove - Warning

The Shed is sadly no more.

I had notice from the Trust on, I think Tuesday to carry out the removal of the Slip and Shed.

They kindly gave me a price from a builder but my son-in-law is an Agricultural Contractor, who like all crop farmers in this wet weather, is unable to get on with planting potatoes until we get some dry weather. So with the bad weather window now, before Peter Allen gets his potatoes in the ground, it seemed now or not for months.

The slip has been taken out and today the clearing of the site has started. Asbestos sheets have been wrapped up ready for the proper disposal. All the wood will be recycled as will every other thing we can.

You are all respectfully asked to stay away from the immediate area of the shed please, in the interests of , you guessed it, HEALTH and SAFETY.

In this instance it is not silly as some have suggested today, but for your safety. With large machines charging around people and dogs can be hard to see, apart from other injuries incurred on the site.

Please, just for say 2 more days can you give us space to be safe.

Many thanks
Ian

Submitted by Ian Hicks

Thursday 5 February 2009

Boat Cove - Latest Update

The National Trust has through Health and Safety issues forced the removal of the old slipway, (which has been done) with the shed to be removed as soon as the weather conditions allow.

The Trust is still open to a replacement shed being built at some time, but in view of growing opposition to any replacement by some members of the community, this is now unlikely to take place.

It is very sad that after the initial support for shed and slip, this community has effectively ended generations of small boat fishing from Boat Cove.

Submitted by Kevin Samson

Wednesday 4 February 2009

Boat Cove Is About To Change

For more than a year the future of the shed and the slipway at Boat Cove has been in the balance. When the facilities became so unsafe as to be un-insurable a large group of people expressed their dismay at what was perceived to be the end of Boat Cove.

However, the National Trust attended a series of meetings with a newly formed Boat Cove Association and there was hope that a way forward could be found. Discussions focused firstly on ways of preserving the existing shed, and then on the possibility of replacing it entirely with a new one. Minutes of the meetings are available on this website, use the search box top right hand corner to find them.

New steps down to the beach were installed, and site visits with a number of experts were conducted in order to explore several possibilities. As February gets into its stride it has become clear that either repairing and propping the old shed, or pulling it up the field are not feasible. The cliff edge is so crumbly, and the elements so unpredictable that props are not likely to remain effective for long. And the poor old shed, being held together with flotsam and jetsam would probably just fall apart at the first attempt to move it. Unfortunately the building is now so unsafe that it needs to be taken down. As soon as the date for the work has been set the information will be posted near the shed and on this website so that folk are able to photograph, paint or sketch the shed, or just walk past it knowing it is for the last time. Please don't approach it too closely! The slip will be hauled up shortly.

The Trust is still very keen to have your comments, ideas and opinions about Boat Cove and its future, particularly regarding the use of the cove by boat owners, and access to the beach. Please contact Julie Hanson, Warden for Godolphin and Mount's Bay on 01736 762479 or Julie.Hanson@nationaltrust.org.uk

Submitted by Julie Hanson
National Trust

Community Event

This Friday, 6th February there is a community consultation event being held, full details of which can be found here.

The aim of the event is for the Church room to become more inclusive to all members of the community whether religious or not.

It is hoped that the event will attract all who are community minded and is an ideal time for the younger members of the village to put their ideas forward with regard to events that could take place there, games night/film club perhaps?

Lets make use of this village facility, go along to the event and put your ideas forward.

Tuesday 3 February 2009

Adverse Weather - Village Crafts Lend A Hand

Val and Kevin would like everyone to know that during this spell of adverse weather conditions they are stocking extra milk and are willing to deliver throughout the village should anyone need them to.

If you would like some milk delivered just give the shop a ring on 711808.

Keep warm everyone.