Penwith Peninsula - Cornwall's far southwest side

See the wonderful Minack Theatre, cut into a spectacular rock face with breathtaking panoramic views over Porthcurno beach. See Penzance and its neighbouring fishing villages of Newlyn and Mousehole crammed in along the coastline.

Don't miss the spectacular scenery on the back road from Penzance to St Ives as you pass ancient stone "quoits" and old tin and copper mines nestled beneath rocky crags.

Lands End still has an atmospheric feel, with crashing waves on three sides of you and views of the Longships Light a mile or so off shore, a lonely reminder of the treacherous waters that have sent many a ship to an untimely watery grave.

Lastly, see Cape Cornwall, its summit still adorned with the chimney of an old tin mine, the shafts of which reputedly ran out beneath the sea for several hundred yards, plus the tiny village of Sennen Cove, huddled against the cliff face, braving the worst Atlantic storms as it puts its fishing boats out to net their catches.

This is truly an atmospheric area of old Cornwall and is different in many ways from the rest of the Duchy. The tiny villages are steeped in legend and folklore and many retain their ancient Cornish names such as Portgwarra, Botallack, Zennor, Nancledra, and Ludgvan.

Quick Tips:

Although Penzance is the only town of any size on the peninsula, it is well served by a fine tourist office that provides free guides to most of the local sights. Similarly, most accommodation, from three-star hotels to basic bed-and-breakfasts, will all feature a shelf somewhere with up-to-date listings of what's going on.

Best Way To Get Around:

All these places are accessible by car, although most of the coastal entries are situated in a cul-de-sac setting due to their proximity to the sea. The far west of Penwith is remote, so cycling is an option for the very fit. Bus services to most of these places are nonexistent as most visitors have a car. There is, however, a bus service from Penzance to St Ives that runs regularly during the season.

From Lelant Saltings near Hayle, you can catch a train that runs on the old branch line to St Ives, passing through Carbis Bay on what has to be one of the most scenic, if not one of the shortest, lines in the UK. Hayle station is 10 miles or so up the line from Penzance, but once there, you will need to walk to Lelant station, which will take around 10 minutes.

This stunning open-air theatre is situated in what must be one of the most dramatic locations in the world. Built into a natural cliff overlooking the beautiful bay at Porthcurno, it has far-reaching views out to the Atlantic and the Logan Rock.

To find the Minack, you take the A30 from Penzance towards Lands End, then after 2 miles, turn left onto the narrow B3283 towards St Buryan. After 1 mile, on the other side of St Buryan, this road becomes the B3315, which you follow for a mile before taking a sharp left onto an unclassified lane that is signposted for the theatre.

Minack means rocky place in Cornish, and the crags beneath the theatre were always a mecca for local fishermen pursuing a catch. This cove remained a fisherman's haven until 1931, when Rowena Cade had her remarkable vision to use the natural contours and setting as a site for an open-air theatre.

She was born the second of four children in 1893 in Derbyshire. In 1902 she took to the stage for the first time at age eight in a production of Alice through the Looking Glass. In 1906 the family moved to Gloucestershire, where her father took on a role within the local college.

Her father died during the First World War, so her mother decided to move to Cornwall, where she purchased a house at Lamorna. Rowena was now in her 20s, and she bought herself a small plot of land on which to build a house at Minack.

Being a remote area with very few opportunities for leisure, she soon became involved with the local amateur dramatic society with a talent for design, and in 1931, a production of The Tempest was scheduled for performance in her garden, with the sea as a fitting backdrop.

Although there was room for a stage, no room was left for an audience, so with this in mind, she had the remarkable foresight to begin construction of a stage and seating area in the gully above the house gardens, with The Tempest being performed in 1932 in the partially completed theatre.

Over the proceeding years, the theatre was developed using local stone and timber found along the Porthcurno shoreline. This was an ongoing project that Rowena pursued up until her death at 89 years old.

Today the Minack is a lasting memorial to her vision and creativity, and regular performances embrace musicals, opera, mime, ballet, farce, comedy, and tragedy, all performed beneath the moonlight with the distant sizzle of the breakers on the granite rocks far below. With the warm summer eddies of a Cornish evening fluttering around you, it is truly a wondrous experience-one never to be forgotten.

St Michael’s Mount is situated in a fairy-tale position, half a mile off-shore from Marazion, at the eastern end of Mount’s Bay, near Penzance. The huge granite crag that rises from the bay is topped with an imposing castle, originally built as a Benedictine priory in the 12th century. The Mount has been the setting for many military sieges and was a regular place of pilgrimage until 1660, when it passed into the ownership of the St. Aubyn family, who still reside in the castle. It is the sister house of the equally famous "Mont St Michel" in Normandy, France. Its battery is still armed with a cannon taken from the wreckage of a French frigate that foundered on nearby rocks during the Napoleonic Wars.

To start your trip, you need to go to the village of Marazion, where a number of local small crafts will ferry you across for a couple of pounds. Alternatively, at low tide, you can walk across via the causeway that stretches towards the Mount, although it is imperative to take heed of the tide times, as the causeway can become submerged very quickly, leaving the walker stranded.

Until Penzance Harbour was built, the Mount’s harbour was the only safe landing for many miles, and as such, it would have been busy with small ships ferrying in coal and timber and departing with tin from one of the many mines that once surrounded the area. Indeed, it is reported that as many as 300 people were once employed here.

Today, the Mount is, of course, a major tourist venue and is operated by the National Trust on behalf of the St Aubyn family. There are several tasteful attractions on the Mount, as well as a restaurant, café, and NT gift shop. Most visitors will, of course, want to make the steep climb up the castle, which affords stunning, panoramic views of Mount’s Bay and beyond. The house has various rooms displaying suits of armour, paintings, porcelain, weaponry, and furniture from differing times in history. There is also a church with lovely stained-glass windows and no less than five wells within the grounds.

The Mount is open all year round, admission charges being £4.60 for adults and £2.30 for children. The stunning, terraced gardens can also be seen for an additional fee of £2.50 and feature rare, botanical species not found anywhere else in the UK.

The village of Marazion is one of the oldest in the UK, dating back to 308 AD. Queen Elizabeth I awarded its charter in 1595. Now, it is little more than a place where motorists attempt to park their cars for the trip to the Mount, but it is worth a quick explore to see the quaint hotels, pubs, and tea rooms that line its narrow streets. From Marazion, it is a five-minute car ride into the centre of Penzance, which features in a separate entry.

Penzance is the most southwestern town in the UK. The only major road that enters the town is the A30, which then continues on for a few more miles west to Lands End. It is also the end of the line for British Rail, with it’s Victorian terminus situated between the road and the sea as you enter the town.

Penzance was Cornwall’s first tourist resort due to its exceptional climate thanks to the Gulf Stream. Indeed, when you see the huge numbers of palms that are dotted around the town, you could be forgiven for thinking that you were in the south of France rather than southwest England.

It has a busy harbour, not just for fishing but also for shipping, and its regular links to the Scilly Isles are situated about 22 miles southwest of Lands End. The Scillonian 3 can often be seen tied up in the harbour, refuelling and taking on supplies for the islanders who in turn have sent flowers and fruit over to the mainland.

There are several notable sights in the town, including the statue of Humphrey Davy, who invented the miners’ safety lamp whilst residing in the county. His statue is situated in front of the imposing Town Hall, dating from 1836, with its huge columns hewn from the local granite. Also of note is the Longboat Hotel, situated at the bottom end of Market Jew Street, with it’s welcome sign over the door in both English and Cornish.

If you follow the quayside around, you will find the Trinity House Museum, with it’s accompaniment of huge buoys outside the building. Trinity House was responsible for the manning, running, and maintenance of every lighthouse in UK waters, and with such, treacherous waters-Cornwall certainly had its fair share. Nowadays most lighthouses have been replaced with automatic beacons that need no human input other than an occasional overhaul.

Follow the harbour road further to arrive at the area known as Wherrytown, from where it's only a short hop to the neighbouring villages of Newlyn and Mousehole. The main claim-to-fame of these two fishing villages is the local delicacy known as Stargazy Pie. This is a pilchard pie, but with a couple of them left whole, with their heads and tails sticking out of the pastry topping. Like most other fishing communities, Newlyn and Mousehole have suffered badly in recent years.

Penzance is truly Cornish, with many of the local villages retaining ancient Kernewek names such as Ludgvan, Nancledra, Madron, and Gulval. All around the area are the long since abandoned mines from a time when Cornwall grew wealthy with what could be extracted from the ground, including tin, copper, silver, and even gold.

Today, however, fortunes have changed and most residents now rely upon the tourist industry in one shape or another to make ends meet. But it is a busy, happy town and well worth the trip to the end of the Duchy to see and enjoy the sights.

Cape Cornwall is a remote spot some three miles north of Lands End. It is instantly recognisable by the old chimney on its summit, a relic from the tin-mining days that saw shafts extend out under the sea for hundreds of metres.

The term Cape actually refers to "a headland or place where two seas meet," and the crashing, foaming breakers below testify to the strong currents that never cease throughout the year.

There was once a bronze age burial site here, situated alongside the ditches and mounds of an earlier Iron Age hill fort. Around the 4th century AD, it was the site of one of the first Christian chapels in west Cornwall, namely, St Helen’s Oratory. The site is now occupied by a ruined farm building.

A mile offshore are the treacherous Brison Rocks, cause of many a shipwreck down through the centuries and widely reported in more modern times to look like " General De Gaulle in the bath". The rocks are also an important breeding ground for sea birds.

Amazing views stretch away in both directions, south across Whitesand Bay towards Sennen and north towards the rocky bastion of Kenidjack castle. Two lighthouses can be seen; the Longships Light, a couple of miles away, and way beyond, on a clear day, the Wolf Rock Light. If you are very lucky and visibility is excellent, it is possible to glimpse the Scilly Isles, some 22 miles distant.

Regarding the chimney stack again, it dates from 1850 and was built to serve the boilers of the Cape Cornwall mine which extracted tin and copper from beneath the sea bed from 1836 – 1879, when it then merged with the St Just United mine, just south of the Cape.

In the early 20th century, the cape was owned by Captain Francis Oates, a prominent mine owner who started his working life at age 12 in Balleswidden mine and worked his way up to be Managing Director of De Beers in South Africa. He eventually returned to west Cornwall, where he built the imposing Porthledden House in 1909.

Cape Cornwall is a wild, wind-swept place that conjures up all that is untamed about the Cornish coast and the memories of the pioneers who made fortunes from her mineral deposits.

Sennen Cove is actually half of two villages, the other being Sennen, both situated about half a mile north of Lands End. As its name depicts, Sennen Cove is bordered by the coast, whereas Sennen is at the top of a steep, sheer cliff from where it overlooks its neighbour.

It is situated at the southern end of Whitesand Bay, its huge expanse of yellow sand stretching away towards Cape Cornwall. It is very much a traditional fishing village, with not that much to attract the visitor other than its own share of lovely sand, although the sea here is often far too rough to bathe in.

There is a huddle of whitewashed cottages that leads to the car park at the far end of the village. There is no road out other than back up the steep lane that brought you down, but this affords stunning sea views. Also in the village is the Lifeboat Station, home of the local boat that has saved many a life and assisted in saving many more over its illustrious history, putting to sea in mountainous waves that would deter all bar the bravest.

There are a couple of pubs and a similar number of cafes and tea rooms. As far as I know, there are no B&Bs and certainly no hotels, but Sennen Cove is a must-see, although it will take you no more than an hour to wander along its sea front. This is how all fishing villages in Cornwall used to look before the onslaught of tourism, and for that, it stands on its own merits as a living, breathing reminder of the "way things were".

The road that winds, twists, and turns along the north coast from St Just to St Ives must be one of the most scenic anywhere in the UK. It climbs up the sides of granite crags, only to slip back to cliff top level revealing old engine houses from the scores of tin and copper mines that once were scattered over the landscape. It squeezes through tiny hamlets, the road narrowing to that just wide enough for a car, between cottages built of massive granite blocks hundreds of years ago to house the brave miners who toiled deep beneath the ground, earning fortunes for their masters but barely scraping a living wage for themselves.

As you leave St Just on the B3306, the first village you’ll see is Botallack, an old mining community. Signposted off to the left is the Levant Steam Engine, a working relic used to raise tin from the nearby mine. Half a mile further on in the village of Pendeen, you will see the sign for Geevor Tin Mine, again on the left. This is still working although to nowhere near the capacity once achieved in the 19th century. A trip around the mine can be bought in the summer months. Still in Pendeen but another mile down the road, take the left turn down to see the Pendeen Lighthouse, built to protect one of the most treacherous and dramatic stretches of coastline in the UK. It is open to the public on all Bank Holiday weekends plus all of August. There is ample free parking for cars and coaches.

Next stop is Morvah, where by the side of the road you will spy a converted Wesleyan chapel dating from 1866. I did knock and ask permission before taking the photograph. A mile or so on towards Zennor, and by the side of the road is a "quoit" or stone stack, one of several in this area of Cornwall dating to pre-historic times and thought to signify an ancient burial site. The general scenery around this area is magnificent, the road winding between the granite tors to your right on the landward side, and the cliff tops overlooking the Atlantic to your left.

Another mile or so will bring you to the ruined remains of an old tin mine, it’s chimney and engine house still standing and in reasonable condition. There is a pull-in here, and the fern covered verges offer a good vantage point from where to capture the image on film. I was lucky for December; it was a clear, bright, sunny day, rare for this time of year.

The road then continues on an equally torturous footing for another five miles or so, past Gurnard Head until you begin the long drop down into St Ives. This is a superb route, but don’t be in a hurry; there is so much to see, particularly if, like me, you choose a beautiful day to explore it.

Lands End is the furthest point southwest in the UK. It is at the end of the A30, which has reached out all the way from London to arrive here in the Penwith Peninsula.

I remember coming here as a boy, on holiday with my folks, when it was merely a landmark; the "First and Last Pub", the "First and Last House", and a chap who took your picture, showing the mileage to your hometown.

Well, he’s still here (or his son maybe), but the rest bears no resemblance to those days of 40 years ago. In the early eighties, the entire site was bought by a wealthy industrialist who obviously wanted to own a slice of Cornwall. That the slice could be profitable was needless to say of primary consideration. You now pay £3 to park your car and, after the brief stroll to the entrance, everything inside costs more money to see. Having said that, there isn’t really much that is worthwhile seeing. Other than an Air-Sea Rescue display and a RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) office, it is nothing but a tawdry display of over-priced restaurants, tacky gift shops, and an amusement arcade.

Fortunately, to see the stunning views out over the sea (even he couldn’t buy that), you can bypass the ticket office and walk around the side by the two preserved boats, one an old trawler, the other a lifeboat. Walk a bit further and you will get your first glimpse of "the end of the UK", with foaming seas crashing over the granite rocks far below and far-reaching views of the Wolf Rock light if you are fortunate.

Nearer to the shore is the Longships light, providing a maritime warning to unwary sailors of the treacherous rocks that they illuminate. Views south and north are spectacular on a fine day but be warned –- in summer, you will be competing with hundreds for that special spot, so come out of season, avoid the crowds, and enjoy yourself far more in the peace and relative tranquility.