Yay! We finally made it to Cornwall!
Living in England, you hear many locals raving about Cornwall. This is THE place for many British people to go during summer months to get their beach fix and still stay in the country. We are also warned to NOT go during holiday weekends/summer holidays as it is just crazy down there! The drive that normally takes 5-6 hours can easily turn into 8-10 hours since once you are through with the big motorways, your only way to navigate around that western chunk of England is via two lane roads in most places.
First week of April, Robert had a Friday day off, so we decided to capitalize on the three day weekend, and headed down south. Katya already had a day off at school as it was the beginning of spring break, and I took the boys out of school for that day as it was their last day of school before a long two-week Easter school holiday break. Their absence was still marked as unauthorized, but that’s just life (from now on, unless it’s an American holiday, they’ll get an unauthorized absence marked for our travel 
).
).
And so away we went, leaving quite early in the morning so we could still do stuff on the way.
After a four and a half easy drive pass Birmingham and Bristol, we made it to our first stop—Tintagel Castle. We found Tintagel village, followed signs towards the nearest parking spot to the castle and started our hike.
Travelling made easy with these cool wooden signs. We were headed to Castle And Haven.
And here is another one.
Oh yeah, so what is this Tintagel Castle all about? At present time, not much of the castle is left. The remains of the castle/fortress are perched on a cliff, overlooking the sea. Historically, this place was used as a trading post in the late Roman times until it was abandoned in the 7th century. Then in the 13th century, Richard, Earl of Cornwall and son of King Henry III, built a castle, the ruins of which we see there today.
According one of the many legends, this is place where King Arthur (the one with the knights of the round table) washed up to shore as an infant. And that’s where Merlin, the magician, carried him to safety. Now, the cave that is located right down on the beach from the castle is called Merlin’s cave. You can walk inside it when it’s low tide.
We were not sure how much we could explore without paying admission to the castle, so we asked the lady at the ticket office. She explained that we could wonder around pretty much everywhere down on the beach or the coastal path, just not on the cliff where the ruins are situated. That was great news! So we went down to the beach first.
It was beautiful!
The kids played, and threw rocks and did whatever kids do next to a body of water.
This mossy rock looked so cool with water trickling down.
We went inside Merlin’s Cave.
It does have an exit on the other side of the cliff, actually, but because of some standing water and rocks, we decided to stay on our side of the mountain.
After playing for a while, we walked up the stairs to the part where we had to pay for the castle. We wanted to take a picture with what people say is “Arthur’s nose”. Do you see that hook in the side of the mountain above my head? That’s part of Arthur’s face. Yeah, it requires quite an extensive imagination to see it fully.
Squish Mark now!!
Alex’s favorite part—the fact that a pile of rocks he is pointing to (the one he was playing with just a few minutes ago) is new from this winter. Very strong rains and winds battered this area of England for weeks, so the rocks just slid down the beach. Crazy.
More beautiful views! We loved this place!
Remember where I mentioned us wanting to go up the coastal path? So we found the sign that showed us the way. The lady at the ticket office recommended this route to get an even more splendid view of the area. We are all healthy and fit, so it appeared to be an easy path.
For most of us-haha.
We got to the top and were greeted with simply jaw-dropping scenery. 
Maybe it was the weather, maybe it was that the kids were loving our short hike--I don’t know. This has to be one of our favorite beautiful places in England, for sure.
Hmmm, Alex’s pictures is nowhere to be found.
After taking a hundred pictures, we headed back to our car. Except, Dr. Watson decided to take a detour towards the old-old church thinking there is a path that takes us directly to the parking lot as well.
But it didn’t so we ended up walking through the cemetery with tomb stones dating back to 1400s…
..Then finding our way through the village back to the car. I love that in England streets are made for walking! So many public footpaths, so many ways to get from one place to another through the fields and villages.
Houses look tiny compared to Robert in this picture for some reason. This is Tintagel village.
It was after lunchtime already when we started our last part of the journey down to Hayle, Cornwall. We were staying at Haven Caravan Resort (but more on that later).
We got to our place around 4 pm, got settled, went to Lidl to get some groceries for the weekend (that’s Lidl store for you below),
I made dinner while Robert and kids went swimming at the indoor pool and watched Percy Jackson movie till late. Heaven for kids! The first day was a great success.
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