Something Guerney That Way Goes http://guerney.posterous.com Most recent posts at Something Guerney That Way Goes posterous.com Thu, 26 Jul 2012 06:49:00 -0700 As I was going to St Ives... http://guerney.posterous.com/as-i-was-going-to-st-ives http://guerney.posterous.com/as-i-was-going-to-st-ives

We decided to train it down St Ives to witness the phenomenon of the English seaside holiday. Also, I'd watched an awful lot of BBC's Coast before we came on this trip and Neil Oliver's hair had convinced me that the experience would be worthwhile. So our Cornwall trip was less for us to enjoy the sea than to see how others could possibly enjoy it while it was still cold in early July. 

St Ives' crooked streets were filled with fudge shops, gift shops, Cornish pasty vendors, decorative crab pots, cobblestones, ice-creameries, tourists and huge aggressive seagulls. The little painted windows of most of the houses were hung with pots of geraniums, pansies, and euphorbia. 

It was dully pleasant. 

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 The gift shops generally sold marine related decorations like fake crabs, diving bells, and plastic starfish.

As soon as we arrived we settled into our little hostel room.

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 Our view - note the decorative crab pot and geraniums. It wouldn't be St Ives without them.

Shortly afterwards we trundled down, Tom with a Cornish pasty in hand, to the little harbour. It was here, outside one of the ten thousand ice-creameries, that I spotted Neil Oliver himself strolling along the foreshore in his khakis and browns, staring seriously out to sea. I was ecstatic. I quickly and quietly told Tom that 'Fucking NEIL OLIVER's over there' and advised discretion. Tom stopped eating his pasty and turned around. Then I noticed it. A gigantic seagull hovering dangerously close over Tom's right shoulder, closing in on the remaining pasty. 

It dived.

Tom screamed.

Neil Oliver turned and glared.

The seagull escaped with the last of the pasty. 

 

After this surreal introduction to the sea, and feeling totally satisfied that we'd experienced the best St Ives had to offer us in that 10 second encounter, we wandered up to the headland and watched swimmers tentatively paddling in the bottle green waves. 

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The following day I decided to join them - just place my feet in the foam and test the water. 

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See if you can spot me in this typical seaside scene!

It was horrible. Within seconds I couldn't feel my toes and sharp pains were shooting up my calves as the muscles in my feet tensed, ached and felt like they were about to curl in on themselves.

But there were people swimming. Most of the poor bastards had wetsuits on, but as I rubbed my aching feet back on the not-particularly-warm sand I watched a pale man in nothing but tiny Speedos stride confidently into the surf like so many other English holidaymakers here, determined that it was summer and that he was enjoying himself. 

 

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