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Jo Jones (nee Waterman) reminisces about holidays in Cornwall in the 1930's.
Every summer, when we were young children we were all packed into the car, luggage, three little girls and mum and dad and two Scottie dogs (Jeannie and Gussie) and drove from home at Worthing in West Sussex to North Cornwall.
Mother and Father had bought a cottage there between Bude and Welcome in a little steep valley running down to the sea. It was called locally 'Duckpool' although it was officially on the map called Coombe Valley.
The sides of the valley rose 300 ft. either side from the little creek that emptied out on the shore and our cottage lay in the crook of the creek only 200 ft. from the beach.
Gorse and heather covered the hills and there was one rocky outcrop where we were forbidden to play because of adders. This became, to our imagination, a place of magic castles and hideouts for bandits. The rocks were warm and great to climb over.
The cottage had no running water (apart from the stream!) No sanitation, no heat and our drinking water came from a little stone-lined well with a wooden door up the valley lane.
There was a chemical toilet in the garage and an open fire in the main room. The four bedrooms were on either side of the main room which had glass doors out to the garden.
I say garden but in actual fact we grew no flowers, there were no beds and it was only when war came that we grew vegetables with great success (fuelled by the chemical toilet which had to be disposed of every now and then!)
The open fireplace in the living room provided heat on cold and stormy nights. Mother cooked on a paraffin stove (the paraffin supplied by a large inverted bottle).
She made extremely tough toffee which we ate by the fire of driftwood and she sometimes reheated a loaf of bread in the oven (a metal box which fitted on top of the burners on the stove) and we would have hunks of hot bread with lots of butter and honey. Food for the Gods we considered it.
We children adored Duckpool. We ran wild. We climbed along the shore, leaping from rock to rock as the tide went out and left them bare. There were rock pools left by the tide where prawns lurked and sea anemones spread their pink tentacles (until you gently poked them).
Sometimes we caught enough prawns for tea. Often we picked up wood for our fireplace and carried it home. Occasionally we would find a green glass float from a fisherman's net.
The beach at Duckpool varied with the tides and seasons. Usually it was divided into two halves with high rocks separating the sandy stretch from a mainly rocky stretch. The left, sandy side was great for surfing. The best time was when the tide was coming in and was almost half way up the beach.
The North Cornish coast is notorious for its currents and the rule was one never waded out too far with a board. Waves are more easily caught anyhow if you are not too deep. And we never swam out.
Every day we would take the metal can (which had a lid) and walk to the Tapes Mill up the road for fresh milk. This was in the days before all herds were TB tested and, unfortunately, our younger sister aged three, developed TB of the neck gland. Happily, she was operated on by a very skilful surgeon at Stratton Cottage Hospital who made the incision in the crease of the jaw line and very minor scarring resulted.
One of the Tapes was reputed to be a witch. And I do remember the subject of 'spells' being discussed. Spells to cure warts and others to cause bad luck.
The name 'Duckpool' supposedly refers to the ducking of over-talkative wives or witches. But where the ducking stool had been I never knew.
When the war came we were temporarily living in the cottage and, when Cleeve Camp started using their guns on the hills above us, we noticed the cottage reverberating. It was quite common to watch the little target plane dragging its silk tube behind it over the sea for gunnery practice.
We had been made aware by our parents, of the dangers of the sea and were not allowed to climb the rocks to other bays without our parents. Nor to surf without them. And we were warned about one particular narrow stony trail running from the other side of the valley floor from us and around the curve of the cliffs and away.
Needless to say that path beckoned my sister Judy and I until one afternoon we started up it. It was fine until we were fairly high and our bungalow just a little speck and we were just about to round the corner.
It was then we stopped dead in our tracks. Unable to go forward or back. Frozen against the rock face horribly aware of the rocks several hundred feet straight down. I could not be persuaded by my older sister to move.
In the meantime, our parents had missed us and been horrified on scanning the valley sides to see two little, immobile specks on the cliff path.
I still do not know how Dad got there so quickly, nor can I imagine how he persuaded us to abandon the path and climb diagonally up further away from the sea and, finally safe home. I think we were all so shaken that no one was even chastised on that occasion.
But the childhood fun of using the lilos on the stream and having battles and playing French cricket with Dad on the short rolling grass were about over. The bungalow was sold and we moved back into 'civilization'. On to school at St. Catherine's P.N.E.U. school, Bude and on with our lives.
Today there is no bungalow there. 'Duckpool' has been made into an official beauty spot. I expect the rabbits and wild life appreciate that very much.
Jo Jones, Canada, 2002
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