Land's End.

*THE PHOTOS CAN BE SEEN FULL SIZE BY CLICKING ON THEM*

The following day was still windy but at least it was dry and some patches of blue sky to be seen.

We decided this would be our day to visit Land's End. Our plan being to catch the bus there and return the three miles back, walking over the beach from Sennen and climbing the steep path up to our site.

We waited in the lane for the bus, it's always a bit hit and miss with the buses around there but the bus turned up, pretty much on time and off we went.

As we approached Land's End the skies started to clear and it looked as if we were going to have a good day.

Walking across from the car park, I noticed a bird I didn't recognise, so zoomed in with the camera and took a photo. When we got home, much later, I was able to identify it as a Stonechat. Fairly sure I've never seen one of those before. Beautiful little bird.

All the commercial bits were still closed as the season hadn't started. This didn't worry us in the slightest, as the Hotel was open and we were able to sit right at the end of the country and have a drink in the sun.

Having fortified ourselves, we started walking back towards Sennen. It was a lovely cliff-top walk and incredibly became so warm and as there was no one else about, I took my jumper off and was walking in jeans and bra for some time!!!

Luckily, I have a sixth sense for when people are approaching, so was fully clothed when a gentleman popped up from the opposite direction and said, "If we walked over to the edge of the cliff, we could see a wreck. It's the Union Star."

This rang a bell in the recesses of my memory and was sure it had some major significance but couldn't, at the time, think what it was.

Mike can't cope with heights but I went over to have a look and take some photos. It was a sad looking, quite small ship and it was still puzzling me as to why I knew the name.

We carried on with our walk, going down onto the beach at Sennen and walking across to where we needed to climb up to our Site.

The site is up near the white house, to the left of centre. Those rocks on the beach were about to become a far bigger problem than anticipated, by the time we reached them.

The rocks covered a far wider area than we anticipated and were also far, far taller than we had imagined when we'd seen them from a couple of miles away. The tide had come in and by now we were both feeling hot and slightly exhausted. The rocks blocking our way didn't look like much and the sea had only just started to reach them. 

Rather than go back across the beach and take the longer road route back we started to clamber over the rocks nearest the sea. This was the narrowest area to cross but the tide was moving further in, every time a new wave broke and we were getting pushed further inland into really large slabs of barnacle covered rocks, with water rushing in below our feet, as we leapt from one rock to another. 

It took us a good ten minutes to clear them and land safely back on the beach the other side and we realised halfway though, we really were putting ourselves at risk. It was getting pretty scary. Another, younger couple were doing the same thing as us and I was quite proud that my remembered, childhood, rock climbing skills got us over the rocks several minutes before them.

There were some cables on the beach, running out into the sea. Mike guessed they were services of some sort to The Channel Islands.

Finally the climb up from the beach was a killer, with several pauses to get our breath. To the one side of the path was a fenced off area, with a notice on it.

I don't need telling twice!!

Much later, when I was able to get onto the Internet again, I looked up the Union Star. The feelings that gave me were hard to describe, the failure of her engines were the cause of the loss of the Penlee Lifeboat. Of course I knew that name, it was a tragedy that should never be forgotten. If anyone is reading this and doesn't know the story, well, you need to know. The crew of Solomon Browne, showed bravery far and above that which any of us can begin to imagine. It's a heartbreaking story and should, according to some, never have happened, had the Union Star accepted a tow before things got so out of hand. The documentary, when the radio of the Lifeboat goes silent...well, I just don't have the words to explain my feelings.

Documentary on the Penlee Disaster

Wikipedia entry about the Penlee disaster.

If you go back now and look at the photo of the wreck, it's hard to imagine the tragedy played out on that rusting hulk.