Holidays of a Lifetime

This week we have been finalising arrangements for our holiday to Kerala in south west India at the beginning of April. This has included negotiating the torturous online application process for obtaining a visa. I think I have finally completed the procedure successfully, and will be making my way to the Indian High Commission in London next Tuesday armed with the requisite signed forms, photographs and kitchen sink.

I have wanted to visit India for a number of years now, and this trip has been arranged as a special holiday to mark the occasion of my Big Five O. Volcanic ash clouds and industrial action permitting we will be landing back at Heathrow on 14th April, the day before my birthday. While we are away I'll be hoping to make a few Palinesque posts on here. That's Michael by the way, not Sarah!

During my hours of grappling with the visa applications, I found myself reflecting on the difference between the holidays our daughter Hannah has experienced over the last few years and the family holidays of my own childhood. Of course there are any number of reasons for this, not least that landing in 2011 would seem like arriving on another planet to a time traveller from the 1960s or 70s. It's a whole different world nowadays. However, whilst the family holidays of my childhood might appear modest, inexpensive and even routine in comparison to the wide range of exciting trips I have been fortunate to enjoy since, they nevertheless possessed a very special magic of their own that has remained a part of me to this day. In this and a couple of posts later in the year I hope via words and pictures to sprinkle a little of that holiday magic of yore into the ether.

Up to and including 1968 when Jonathan was born to complete our half dozen, we spent our two week summer holiday with our grandparents in their spacious house by the sea in Worthing, West Sussex. Strictly speaking calling it our 'summer holiday' is a bit misleading. It's not as though come February half term we could be found hitting the slopes in Val d'Isere. But it was our holiday, and it occurred in the summer. From 1969 onwards, however, we set our sights further afield. Cornwall was our destination for the first two years.

Cornwall sounded great. But first we had to get there! This necessitated a very early start followed by an eight hour stint in our Bedford minibus all the way to Botallack, near St Just, almost at the very western tip of England.  The minibus was well up to the task of carrying eight people plus all the necessary holiday paraphernalia on such a lengthy journey. However it didn't offer the most comfortable of passages, especially when it was your turn to sit on one of the sideways on seats in the back. Clunk click every trip? You'd be lucky.

Sandwiches all round.

I didn't appreciate it at the time, but looking back at the photographs now makes me realise what a magnificent looking vehicle our minibus was. Definitely a touch of the art deco about it.

Our stylish minibus.

Our accommodation for our two week stay in Cornwall was the cottage belonging to our Aunt, the artist Rose Hilton and her husband, the influential abstract artist Roger Hilton. For the duration of our holiday they decamped along with our cousins, Bo and Fergus to a house not far away. I believe this may have been Roger's home from his previous marriage - I'm not sure. I do remember, though, going to spend some time there one afternoon. I think only a couple of us went, but I clearly remember being completely taken aback by the sight of fully grown adults wandering around the garden stark naked. Unaccustomed as I was at the time to such Bohemian ways, this vision made quite an impression on me.

This next photograph taken back at our base suggests that the artistic influence was all around. Is it a real cat? Is it just a shadow! Or maybe just a representation of a cat? Whatever it was, it certainly made Stephen laugh.

Chasing shadows?

Botallack is a beautiful part of the world, with its remoteness part of the attraction. I remember staring at amazing cloud formations during the day and gazing up at the most fantastic starlit night skies in the evening. And in between the sunsets were truly spectacular. Behind the cottage at Botallack was what would later become known as 'Poldark Country' when it formed part of the backdrop to the eponymous television drama of the mid-1970s based on the novels by Winston Graham. A walk of a few hundred yards from the cottage would bring into view the dramatic sight of the old Botallack Tin Mine clinging to the rugged coastline:

The last two remaining engine houses of the Botallack Crowns Mine.

Also nearby was Pendeen Lighthouse, a scenic spot for a couple of family photographs.

The Lighthouse Family.

Open neck shirts were all the rage in 1969.

The lighthouse tower is 17 metres high with the light itself 59 metres above the mean high water level. However, despite having guided passing ships through the dangerous waters around Pendeen for nearly 70 years at the time of our visit, the beacon was unable to prevent Paul from stumbling down the hillside and splitting his right knee open on a craggy rock. He was probably distracted by the effect of his Dad's shirt open to the waist, providing an impression of Errol Flynn in his prime. It was a real 'you could see the bone sticking out' injury that necessitated a trip to hospital. But, as is often the case with childhood injuries, the recovery time was rapid and within a few days the patient was pictured sitting happily on top of another rock with just a plaster to protect his wound.

The operating table?

A speedy recovery.

Our visit to Pendeen Lighthouse was unusual in that it represented a departure from the routine that was established early on in Cornwall and continued pretty much uninterrupted for every day of every subsequent childhood holiday. It went something like this. After breakfast we would head into town (in Cornwall this was St Just) to buy fresh rolls and fillings for lunch. We would then return to our holiday accommodation where Mum would prepare lunch whilst Dad (sometimes assisted by a son or two) would load up our current vehicle with everything needed for a day by the sea. It would then be off to the beach where we would stay until sometime between 5:00 and 6:00 pm before heading home for tea, followed by reading or perhaps a few games and then it would be time for bed. This routine did develop minor, and I stress the word minor, elements of sophistication as we all got older, but essentially it remained the same for the next 8 years. And whilst admittedly memories of childhood summers are often infused with endless retrospective sunshine, I can honestly say that over those 8 years for us it only ever rained a couple of times. It must have been so, because otherwise our metronomic routine would have been interrupted, and it never was.

Our daily destination was the wonderful beach at Nanjizel. It was a fairly small sandy cove that was never ever busy. Often we would be the only family there. This was undoubtedly due to its splendid isolation, only being accessible via a lengthy walk downhill from what can only loosely be described as a car park that in itself was at the end of a long unmade track leading off a narrow winding country lane. Sadly some 20 years after we enjoyed its delights, much of the sand at Nanjizel was washed away by storms. In recent years, though, it has started to return. As indeed I must one day.

The long and winding road...... to Nanjizel Beach.

A few years later when I was at secondary school, my Mum wrote an essay for me. By way of explanation, I'll add that I was going through a couple of lazy years at school and Mum probably despaired of me ever getting any homework done at the time so decided it was necessary to do this particular piece herself. Anyway, the essay was about Nanjizel and it was a masterpiece. To my shame I was chosen by my English teacher to read it out to the rest of the class as he was so impressed with vibrant description and imagery in the text. One phrase in particular sticks in my memory:

'The only reminder that we were in the twentieth century was the occasional whirring of a helicopter overhead.' Promising bit of writing for an eleven year old, don't you think?

More spare ribs than a Chinese Restuarant!

The latest addition to the family enjoying the dramatic rocks of Nanjizel.

And that was just what Nanjizel was like. It was a world apart where we happily spent hour after hour playing and digging in the sand, climbing over the rocks and splashing around in the clear clean water. Only, of course, stopping for our filled rolls, orange squash and apple or banana when it was time for lunch. Who could ask for anything more? We certainly didn't and never hankered to be going anywhere else. The trudge back up the hill at the end of the day was always a weary one, and the drive back to Botallack in the minibus would be characterised by glowing cheeks and sleepy heads.

Uncomplicated? Yes. Healthy? Definitely. Blissful? Unashamedly so. Boring? Never!

Happy times.