Roadtrip Day 5: Devon to Cornwall to Weymouth

8th Oct, 2010
Photos can be found here.

Another very busy driving day that involved me driving from Paignton to Tintagel Cornwall and back to Weymouth.

Dartmouth

First stop was Dartmouth.
Originally i was going to go see Dartmouth Castle... built in the 1300's by a guy who might have been the inspiration for the shipman in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. (I did the Pardoner's tale for HSC English).

You need to take a short ferry across to the islet that the castle is on and since i was a little pushed for time I decided to give it a miss as there was lots more driving to do to eventually get to Tintagel this arvo.

Then it was onto Plymouth... so basically a drive to all the coastal towns...
Stopped there for lunch but didnt really see much of the town or the coastal outlook of Plymouth. 2 hrs drive to Tintagel or so my GPS said and i didnt want to get there too late and not have time to look around.

So I dont know if most of Cornwall is little towns with very narrow roads between them or if my GPS was taking me 'the back way'... but the roads were so narrow... at some stages there it's so narrow only one car can pass at a time. Am guessing there arent usually many cars at one time otherwise i could predict disaster or gridlock.Ok so doesnt look that narrow in the pic but another car coming the opposite direction definitely wouldnt fit on that road... and the speed limit is 60mph = 95km/h which is crazy... watch out for cars coming around corners... actually pray there isnt another car coming around the corner cos you cant see...

So Tintagel - a town that is the site of a few legends... The legendary birthplace of King Arthur and also mentioned in poems about the romance of Tristan and Yseult (Tristan and Isolde - 2006 movie).
There is a ruined castle the Tintagel castle that overlooks the Cornish sea. Am guessing that in its day it would have been very impressive on the clifftops.

I have a fascination with Arthurian legend (wonder why....) Tintagel seems to cash in on the association with the "Camelot Amusement Centre" (penny arcade) and shops like "Merlin's Pasties", "Pendragon gifts" and "King Arthur Bookshop".

The legend dates King Arthur to the 6th century. But the Tintagel Castle was built by Richard, Earl of Cornwall and brother of Henry III in the late 1230's. More recent archeology has found pottery and other items dating from the 5th-7th centuries leading them to belive the castle was built over the site of previous settlement - hence the birthplace of King Arthur...
The castle wasnt kept for long and became ruins in the 1400's.

Archway out of what was the Courtyard gate

view across to what would have been the upper and lower courtyards on the mainland

the guidebook doesnt tell me what this nook is... perhaps it's for the guards who might have been guarding this entrance to the Island Courtyard.

From Tintagel, I visited the Arthurian centre which is closeby. There is still archeology going on as digs unearth the remains of a Melorne Village dated around the 13th century. The plains around this area which is called Slauterbridge is said to be the scene of the final battle of King Arthur when he is killed by Mordred. There is a stone by the river that is said to be Arthur's stone - marking the place where he fell in the battle.


Well I need to be back in Bournemouth at AECC tomorrow for another day conference... but it's quite a drive back there (about 3 hrs)... decided to split the journey a bit and stop somewhere about 1hr from Bournemouth so it would be an easy drive tomorrow morning.

Weymouth

So dinner around Exeter which is the capital of Devon... and then I finished up for the night at Weymouth. Another seaside town... It is a bit like Lemon Tree Passage in NSW though... a place where old people go to retire. But it is a very popular UK holiday destination due to its stretch of beach.
Weymouth has lots of beachside townhouses... very narrow streets and not much parking. I had a very small room that reminded me of Harry Potter's closet in the Dursley's house.