don't just dream it, do it

For many many years I have felt some sort of special connection with a particular place. My mother's family is based in this far flung corner of England. I spent most of my summer holiday's throughout my years in this ancient country, combing the beaches and walking the cliffs. Initially with my family and then by myself from the age of 14, when I ventured away from home alone for the first time with a bag on my back- a bug that has never left me since. Later, I dragged my great friends, Chris, Paul and Charlotte down there for a post high school binge in a caravan. I have walked hundreds of miles along the coast, on the moors and through the bucolic farmlands and villages. I have worked there as a barman and lived in a tent for many months just before joining up. I visited there for a couple of weeks just this last July, to savour the sights, flavours, sounds and smells of this treasured county. During all these years, even as a young teenager, dragging my soaking wet rucksack from the sea after I had fallen in on my first lonely sojourn to these rugged shores, for some reason, I knew I belonged.

These cliffs, where my father first met my mother and so, to me, imbue a traditioanl sense of romance in a world where romance seems to have been lost to material and selfish gain, stir up my heart more than anywhere in the world. The light, the flowers, the scents, the golden ales, the ridiculously small churches, the sense of history, the power of the sea and the memories, all contrive to empower my dream of one day living permanently in this glorious land of funny accents - Cornwall, of course. 

So, I say to myself, should I dream it, or should I live it? These photos from my last visit will answer that question. Nowhere that I have been in the world - and that really is many many places, does it quite as well.

See you all down there!

Swimming at Trebarwith - Again!