All right, kids, here we go.  We’re finally on our way to CORNWALL!  Which is, oh, just a place that I’d, like, always wanted to visit.  But first things first.  On our way out of Dartmoor, we saw a yak in the road.  Seriously, he was just there, chowing down on some heather or something.  At least, I think he was a yak.  My mom said that’s what he was, and she taught first and second grade for years, so she’s well versed in animals-starting-with-the-letter-[fillintheblank].

Yak photography adventures over, we headed west, bound for Cornwall.  I’ll admit I was a little nervous about this part of the trip.  Our guidebook didn’t exactly recommend Cornwall – not that it discouraged going there, but it just wasn’t one of the places that Rick Steves thought was worth our limited time in England.  And while I’ll usually trust Rick, I had really always wanted to go to Cornwall.  Or, well, maybe not always, but certainly since the first time I read Daphne du Maurier’s classic suspense novel Rebecca.  And we had sought the advice of a friend who lived in England for four years, and she encouraged us to go.  But there was a lot of pressure riding on these few days in Cornwall.  Not only were we flying blind for at least part of the time (since our guidebook didn’t include Cornwall, we had a couple of ideas for activities but not enough to fill our time there), but one of our Cornwall days was my 30th birthday.  I had spent a lot of time thinking to myself along the lines of, “I really can spend my 30th birthday anywhere in the world that I want to, so where do I want to go?”  That’s a lot of pressure to put on a destination.

Wait, but first we have to get there!  Hubby mapped out a route to drive from Dartmoor to Cornwall, and planned a stop in the middle to stretch our legs.  He literally picked a spot halfway along the drive or so, then looked for attractions nearby.  And what he found was Restormel Castle.  Apparently he thought it was just a pile of ruins, and we were really just there to walk around a bit and get the blood flowing before we finished the drive to St. Ives.  But it turned out to be a really well-preserved and fascinating site!

The castle ruins included a large green in the middle, and were perfectly safe to wander about and climb on (using the stairs, of course).  And to add to the experience, each “room” in the castle included an informative placard explaining what the room was used for when this was a working castle.  We saw the kitchen, the chapel, the lord’s bedroom, and others.  Hubby and I finished off the visit with a walk around the upper ring of the ruins… well, almost a run for him – he doesn’t much like heights – and a stroll for me, since I lurve heights.  (Really, I do.  I have a thing for views from high places and I could spend hours gazing from an observation post.  The higher the elevation, the better.)

Then we wandered around the outside of the ruins a bit, checking out the fortifications and some more views, before reluctantly heading back toward the car.  For a quick stretch-the-legs stop that we really didn’t know anything about, Restormel Castle was a fun and fascinating adventure!  We’d have liked to stay longer, but we had to get moving to…

St. Ives!  I picked this cute surfer town for my b-day celebrations with the help of TripAdvisor and my aforementioned friend, who had been here and highly recommended it.  This (above) was the view from our B&B.  Stunning, no?  Hubby and I rolled in and were treated to a lovely cup of tea and a chat with the B&B managers, and then ambled down the hill to explore the city.  But that’s a story for another week… because there’s plenty more Cornwall to come!

Stay tuned, because next Friday we’ll explore more of Cornwall…