Lizard Peninsula Heritage Trust

An environmental charity dedicated to the recognition, protection, enhancement and enjoyment of the Lizard Peninsula Friends of the Lizard 1997-2006 Newsletter No 42 January 2010 Registered Charity No 1092934

Continued...

Events: President’s Prandials

After three successive and successful years of winter social events with our hosts Mary and Tony Vyvyan, we decided that nothing could match those Merthen evenings, so we are not even going to try. However, rest easy, those gourmands among you; our President, John Grierson, and his Missus have come up with a new idea to banish the January blues, greens and any other leftovers from Christmas. A President’s Lunch will be held on Saturday 16 January 2010 at the most southerly café in Cornwall: Polpeor Café on Lizard Point. Time: 12.45 for 1 o’clock.

Peter Hendy, who owns and runs the café, will open specially for us, so it will be a very select event! But it need not be a posh affair; as casual as you like, but wear something warm and walk there from the Lizard green, or drive right to the door - there is plenty of parking. The menu is extensive, the food is very good indeed, and the service is swift and friendly. Wine will be provided by the President, but if you would like to bring your own favourite, then please feel free to do so.

The seating is limited to 25 people, so please book early to secure your place. A phone call or e-mail to me will put you on the reserved list, and a non-refundable deposit of just £5 will ensure we keep a seat and plate warmed for you. The deadline for accepting bookings is Saturday 9 January 2010.

Those of you who have already visited Polpeor will know that you can be assured of a really good meal; those of you who haven’t, it’s about time you did! All that is required to make it perfect is your company. Jane Grierson 01326 290677 or: pjcarmelin@gmail.com

A Cornwall National Park

The Cornwall ‘Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty’ (AONB) is one protected area, split up into 12 separate parts, representing the finest of our coast, moorland, farmland, rivers and estuaries. It is an internationally important landscape, valued for embodying the special character of Cornwall, underpinning the local economy and everyone’s quality of life. It is nurtured by effective partnership, sufficient resources and only sustainable development. The whole of the Lizard Trust’s area of concern is included in the ‘South Coast Western’ part of the Cornwall AONB.

In his talk at our 12th Annual General Meeting, as reported by Jane Grierson, Peter Maxted mentioned past initiatives to designate the whole of Cornwall as a National Park and why the attempts failed. Below, is a small extract from the Cornwall Lecture 2008 – ‘Could Cornwall have it all?’ - given by Professor Robert Tregay who is an Honorary Professor at the University of Wales and a Senior Partner of LDA Design. In this extract, Professor Tregay, re-examines the case and proposes a way forward, with a message that encapsulates so much of what the Lizard Trust stands for:

“National Parks promote both the protection of landscape beauty and quiet open-air countryside recreation. In AONBs, recreation is not an objective of designation. Another key difference is that National Parks have a much higher profile, higher budgets and dedicated planning powers. When we look at the situation in Cornwall, therefore, we find an AONB which is low profile in terms of its status. There is no ‘technical’ reason why a strong case could not be made for re-designating the Cornwall AONB as the Cornwall National Park – setting aside the financial and political issues.

But there are equally good reasons why a simple re-designation would not be appropriate for Cornwall. The first is that it would bring with it the establishment of its own National Park Planning Board and I can find no case for this, given its disparate, broken-up geography and, especially, as we launch the new unified Government for Cornwall. Secondly, I believe the time has come to explore new ideas, backed by new legislation, for AONBs and National Parks. This review would require the landscape to be shaped by sustainable land management

Lastest News - We have a new Patron !

We are delighted to report that Mrs Jill Morison, Cornwall’s High Sheriff in 1996-97, and now Deputy Lieutenant, has agreed to become our new Patron, a position that has remained unfilled since the death of General Sir Richard Trant in 2007. More news on this in the next Newsletter.

News from the AGM

It was agreed at the AGM in November that membership rates would remain unchanged for the next membership year starting on 1 April. However, it was also agreed that the 'Life' category, for new applicants only, would be replaced by a '15-Year' facility, at the same price of £75, in common with many other similar organisations.

For those members who do not pay by Standing Order, please may we ask you to renew your membership promptly at the end of March or early April, and consider using the Standing Order facility.

It was also agreed that the papers for the next AGM, in November 2010, to be sent out next October, would include this year's Minutes and next year's Financial Statement, as an improvement in information to our members.

Both sides of the Helford River are included in the Lizard's part of Cornwall's AONB. Aerial photo by Steve Hartgroves, CHES.

practices to enhance nature conservation and resource protection. And it would bring together, where appropriate, marine, coastal and land designations.

My proposal is that all AONBs should be re-designated as National Parks, a term which everyone understands and which would end the second-class status of AONBs. The primary purpose of designation – the conservation of natural beauty – would be preserved, but there would be a review of the statutory basis and purposes, to ensure they are tuned to the issues of today, not those of 1949. The process could start in 2009, sixty years on from the Act which brought us National Parks in England and Wales, and fifty years on from the designation of the Cornwall AONB.

These ideas are complex for many reasons, and would need thorough testing. I propose that Cornwall could be the test bed for this review of National Parks in England and Wales. If proved feasible, and supported by Natural England and Government, it would give enhanced status to the existing AONB and unify the marine, coastal and land environments. Planning powers would be held by One Cornwall, not by a separate planning board. The new Cornwall National Park would therefore be symbolic of the direction Cornwall would take in the future. It would put Cornwall’s finest landscapes on the top table, not as something separate, but as an integral part of our vision for the whole of Cornwall.

I am looking for a new outlook within Cornwall. Economic difficulties and relatively low levels of economic wealth should not be used as a reason to accept low levels of environmental protection and design quality. Cornwall should invest in great design and environmental quality, in our rural landscapes, in our towns and in a new Cornwall National Park, setting new standards of design which signal a new Cornwall. We should actively seek forms of economic development which are in harmony with the environment and which can enrich it, and reject those which do not.

I therefore believe that Cornwall really could have it all – economic development, a beautiful environment and a great way of life. Cornwall could pioneer a new, genuinely sustainable future, drawing on its enviable natural resources, and reinforcing the very concept of Cornishness.”

From ‘A Celebration of our Landscape’, published in 2009 to mark the 50th anniversary of Cornwall’s AONB.

David Richardson

A Cornwall National Park - Continued

Kynance Gate walk with James Gossip - see under ‘Short but Sweet’ article on supplementary page.

AGM & AONB

There’s an eyeful for you! But our twelfth AGM, on 17 November 2009, was a very special one, as was the after-meeting speaker. The event drew a record crowd of 28, possibly attracted by the memory of last year’s sparkling presentations from members of the Committee making their official business reports, possibly by the thought of a delicious mini-buffet and a glass of something good; or, even more likely, by the prospect of an illustrated talk by the enticingly sounding Colette Holden.

Colette is the Manager of the Cornwall Area Of Outstanding Natural Beauty Partnership, (we are talking here of countryside, not femininity, although for all we know Colette could have qualified in either case). As such, her over-burdened schedule meant that, sadly, she could not join us after all, but we welcomed instead the Partnership’s Peter Maxted, who did his best to step into the breach, and more than succeeded. He is not their Communications Officer for nothing.

Peter’s talk was illustrated with some attractive views of various parts of the county, but the facts themselves were pretty absorbing too. You can find out more from the website (Cornwall-AONB.gov.uk), and I would recommend that you do. It is a very user-friendly site and there are all sorts of local happenings which we ought to know about, from the studies of invasive foreign species (the South African Hottentot Fig and your President being two in point!) to water sources, solar panels and composter toilets.

AONBs came into being in 1953, after the idea of Cornwall becoming a National Park was rejected since not all parts were suitable. (Where could these have been?). Twenty seven per cent of the county now constitutes one AONB, in twelve separate areas, and they do have legal status; but it is a constant battle for the AONB Partnership to balance such priorities as tourism, development and energy. AONBs have, in planning law, the same protection as National Parks, but in practice this is, according to Peter, impossible to implement.

A lively Q&A session followed Peter’s talk, particularly related to the contentious topic of wind-turbines, after which we eagerly took part in his Post-It Poll. This involved three different colours of Post-It notes, on which one could write the answer to three questions and stick them on appropriate parts of the map provided of the Lizard Pensinsula. The questions were: What do you value most about your area of Cornwall? What concerns you most? What should be saved? Peter indicated that we should be free to write exactly what we thought, so you can imagine that most answers were interesting, a few were outlandish, and one or two borderline rude! All demonstrated clearly that we feel passionately about the part of Cornwall in which we live, and are grateful that we have so many organisations prepared to care for it.

Jane Grierson

Gunwalloe Cove - aerial photograph by Steve Hartgroves, Cornwall Historic Environment Service.

Personalities from our membership – The Bostock family Continuing our series of interesting personalities among our members, here is the Bostock family. David and Angela Bostock, together with their three sons George, Fergus and Will, have all been Life Members of the Lizard Trust for over 10 years. Although they live in Cheshire, Gillan is very much home-from-home for them. Here, Angela reminisces on so many happy holidays there. We’ve been going to Gillan for ninety-four years. Or to be more precise, I have spent fifty-three summers there and my husband, David, a mere forty-one. My parents first took us as a family to Gillan Cove in the 1950s. We travelled down from Cheshire every August and spent a month sailing, swimming and walking the cliff paths. In those days, before the motorway, it would take us about eleven hours to get there. We often made the journey overnight as we towed a boat down with us. As there were five of us in the car, we used to send luggage on by train, to be collected at Helston station. This had to stop, of course, when Dr Beeching shut the line.

Gillan Cove has changed little since then. The majority of houses are still holiday cottages. We stayed in most of them over the years. Our first holiday was in an old green caravan, hidden away in the hydrangea bushes at the top of Gillan Cove House garden. I remember that one side opened up to give the most wonderful view of St Mawes and St Anthony Head in the distance. We had our first taste of proper Cornish ice cream that year which was a rich yellow and, amazingly, arrived on certain days by ice cream van which reversed down to the beach. Holidays were spent mainly messing about in boats. There were so many sailing dinghies on the beach belonging to holiday-makers like us, that my father, Nigel Boyle, started a “Gillan Regatta” which was to become an annual event. It was very well organised with a handicap system for the various classes and even a starting gun from the Herra, the small area of headland now owned by the National Trust. Long before the days of Health and Safety we had a splendid wooden diving board off the rocks below the Herra. This provided endless fun for everyone. At low tide we went shrimping in the creek or walked along the cliff path to the Nare to catch good sized crabs off the point. Something exciting seemed to happen every holiday. One morning, we woke to find a school of whales in the creek. They were trying to beach themselves and were successfully saved from doing so by holiday makers, local residents and the RSPCA who, together, managed to turn them back towards the open sea. This was not before they’d tried to go up the Helford and it was well over 24 hours before we knew they were safe again. This event made the national papers as well as the television and Pathé News at the cinema. The following year we opened the curtains to see the Royal Yacht ‘Britannia’ at anchor in the bay, not far beyond the Nare. The Queen, Prince Philip and their children came into the creek in their launch, looking for a beach to go ashore. They eventually went to picnic on what we called ‘cow beach’, at the mouth of the Helford. By the mid 1960s, I started my training as a nurse at St Thomas’ Hospital in London. It was difficult to plan my off-duty to make the journey to Cornwall. I usually managed it after doing a stretch of night duty. Sometimes, I even caught the sleeper at Paddington and only spent a long weekend with the rest of the family. In 1969, my medical student boyfriend, hitch-hiked his way to Gillan from London, to join us for a weekend. That summer we were staying at The Bents, which is right on the beach. The boyfriend, David, was so captivated by the place that he came down again the following weekend, this time on his 250cc BSA. My father was rather impressed by what he thought was such devotion to his daughter; I wasn’t quite so convinced. In the 1970s, I became a Sister at St Thomas’; David was by then an Anaesthetist there. We got married, he became a GP. and we bought a house in South London. Our first son was born, then another and another! We’d decided to move out of London and up to Cheshire, but continued to have our Cornish holidays much as before, the journey by then, being a lot quicker than in my childhood. The boys learned to row, to sail and later, to windsurf in Gillan creek. We managed to buy our own holiday house in the cove twenty years ago, much to our delight. In their teenage years, our sons all spent time as boat-boys, working the whole summer at Sailaway at St Anthony. There, they helped with the hiring of boats and teaching adults and children to sail. They all felt that this was marvellous experience for later life, not to mention help in completing their UCAS forms. And so to the present. The family join us in Cornwall each year, at various times. The eldest two are doctors and the youngest lives in Geneva where he works for a large international company. Our eldest son was married this year and they hope to bring the new baby (due soon) to Gillan at Easter. We all still enjoy sailing and have a Contessa 32 moored in the Helford. Although I have now retired, David is still working. I hope it won’t be for much longer and that we may spend more, if not all, of our time in Cornwall. We let our holiday house throughout the year, when we’re not there ourselves, through local agents based in Coverack. Many of the visitors return year after year, just as we did. We believe everyone who gets to know this wonderful part of the world, simply has to keep coming back.

Angela Bostock

Angela and David Bostock, enjoying their sailing.

Newsletter photography

At present, due to budgetary constraints, our Newsletters are always published economically in monochrome. The photographs are always of high quality and can be seen to their best, in full colour, on our website www.lizardpeninsulaheritagetrust.org.uk Better still, join the increasing number of our members who opt to receive Newsletters solely by Email, saving us reproduction and postage costs. Simply Email your request to David Richardson (see bottom of back page).

Chairman David Richardson Bodlowen, Coverack, Helston TR12 6TP 01326 280058

Vice Chairman Colin Chapman Chy Lean, Mawgan, Helston TR12 6AY 01326 221648

Secretary David Richardson Bodlowen, Coverack, Helston TR12 6TP 01326 280058

Treasurer Geoff Blackman ‘Chy-an-Mordhu’, 5 Park Enskellaw, Mullion TR12 7JG 01326 241722

Committee Avril Evens Tresaddern House, Ruan Minor, Helston TR12 7NA 01326 290629

Committee Ann Chapman Chy Lean, Mawgan, Helston TR12 6AY 01326 221648

Committee Gill Richardson Bodlowen, Coverack, Helston TR12 6TP 01326 280058

Committee Anne Roberts Pipers Green, Garras, Helston TR12 6LP 01326 221243

Assistant Secretary Prue Towner Cracklewood, 10 Doctors Hill, St Keverne TR12 6UX 01326 281230

Co-opted Member Lynda Blackman ‘Chy-an-Mordhu’, 5 Park Enskellaw, Mullion TR12 7JG 01326 241722

Published by Lizard Peninsula Heritage Trust, Bodlowen, Coverack 01326 280058 E-mail: d813richardson@btinternet.com Web site: www.lizardpeninsulaheritagetrust.org.uk

President … John Grierson

Local businesses - ‘Sky High Photographs’ - Aerial and Mast Photography in Cornwall We continue our series of articles on businesses on the Lizard Peninsula, with particular reference to those that are unusual or have an interesting story to tell. Andrew Fletcher who, until September, was production manager with Cury-based Javan Sports Cars, has set up Sky High Photographs, an initiative that involves two of his hobbies – model plane flying and photography. As a price guide, Andrew carries out commissions starting from £50 and existing photographs are sold at £10 for 12x8” (A4): I have been flying radio-controlled aircraft as a hobby from the age of six, so have achieved excellent and responsible piloting capabilities. With a background in engineering and CAD design, I have designed and built both sports cars and model aircraft. Photography has been my passion for many years and I recently decided to start this business using my experience of the two hobbies. Sky High Photographs uses the latest in radio-controlled technology to take stunning high-quality photographs from the air, for commercial and private clients throughout the south-west. I use a 10.1 megapixel Canon camera and a small lightweight HD video camera mounted to the plane or the telescopic mast to achieve amazing photos.

The business has two options for taking aerial photography. Firstly, there is my electric-powered aircraft – a Weston UK Cougar with a wingspan of just over 4 feet and weighing about 4 lbs including the camera equipment. The model is powered by a powerful and very quiet brushless electric motor, coupled with the latest in Lithium battery power. One charge will allow up to 20 minutes of flight time, but I usually limit flights to 10 minutes for safety reasons. Re-charging of the batteries is done while in the car, thus making the whole package environmentally friendly. Plane construction is traditional balsa wood, but built in a modern way which makes the plane strong but light. This works very well to take photos from various altitudes, without disturbing wildlife or people. Any rough field can be used for flying, as the plane is hand launched and landed at a very low speed so it can be ‘floated’ in very gently. Once airborne and in the right position, I stop the motor while taking photographs and restart to gain height again. A typical flight produces about 50 photos, with framing and composition by an experienced guess, allowing selection later to produce the best results. The camera equipment on board would allow the view to be seen from the ground, but that would require a second person to assist. The second option is to use a telescopic mast system that can be extended to over 40ft for more detailed closer work inside and out. This is fully radio controlled and can be set up for that perfect photo or panoramic view. The mast can be vehicle or tripod mounted so can be elevated almost anywhere. This has many uses from house sales, to achieve the best photo of the property, and land to planning and structural surveys inside and out, or maybe an aerial photo of the wedding party.

Andrew Fletcher, Ruan Minor andrew@skyhighphotographs.co.uk

Andrew Fletcher with plane

Cadgwith from Andrew's model aircraft.