Redruth to Bristol

Apple Juicing in Ponsanooth

October 2025

Since the last blog we have left behind the long days of summer with fond memories of great walks, swims, eating outside and lots of sunshine. As well as fascinating trips to Oxford and Whipsnade to celebrate friends' 40th wedding anniversary and a glorious two weeks in South West France with a dear friend. Neither were by train so by my own rules, not to be included here! A wet Spring followed by a warm summer have led to a bumper crop of apples. Our wonderful old apple tree has completely over achieved this year! So it despite feeding us, slugs, wasps, blackbirds and magpies, there are still masses that are rotting and hopefully fertilising the soil for next year. We took a big bag of windfalls to the Juicing Day in the village and had great fun feeding the hand cranked 'musher'. The juice was delicious.

Breakfast at Mansfield College, Oxford and close encounter with a lioness at Whipsnade Zoo

Glimpses of Perigord Vert including canoeing on the River Dronne.

But as I said I won't be writing about these ...

So I start in the pitch dark as Storm Amber is thrashing her way across the country with high winds and lashing squalls. I drive to Redruth behind a Highway Maintenance vehicle which feels faintly reassuring and muse on whether the train driver has packed an overnight bag in case of delays - trees or cows on the lines, banks of leaves, flooding. Is this really ideal for a day trip to Bristol? At the station the lights are on, waiting room is open, reassuring, and the train is on time. The few passengers have their hoods up and no-one is speaking. Meanwhile the wind is forcing the incongruous palm tree to dance frantically, flailing like a dervish. I remember palm trees in Egypt during the Hamseen windy season when they would dance a dry dusty frenzied dance engulfed in a whirlwind of sand and grit. So different to this rain sodden cavorting. How curious that they should so thrive in our climate.

Truro is livelier with more suitcase dragging passengers. By Bodmin it is light and by Liskeard there is a hum of voices in the carriage. Outside huge grey clouds are shot through with threads of gold and interspersed with glimpses of blue sky. Promises well.

We change train at Plymouth for Bristol and I don't realise that it is two connected trains and that you cannot cross between the two. The catering is in the other train ... A group of middle aged people evidently setting out on holiday are tucking into picnic breakfast with gin and tonics at about 8.30am. I need a coffee so jump trains at Totnes. Might not have been a good idea as the coffee is pretty weedy and at Newton Abbot a group of about fifteen men get on with crates of beer and loud excitement. He who shouts loudest gets heard. I should sneak back to the other train but someone sits next to me and I become inert. They are raucous, rude, excitable, laugh as if their mouths may split, totally unaware of anyone else in the space as they share intimacies and start singing, mainly out of tune. They are, without a doubt, happy.

This trip is building like a symphony; starting out very quietly and intimately, allowing for individual tunes and instruments, then building slowly to a crashing crescendo as the percussion takes over. By Bristol Templemeads all the strands resolve and dissipate as we all go our own ways. The loud ones continue to 'Spoons'. I just hope they won't be on the return train.

My destination is The Engine House just outside Station. An an old workshop conversion into pop up office and conference space. I am there for a joint Literature Works and Writers' & Artists Yearbook Event called 'How to get Published'. Seventy aspiring writers, all longing to see their book in bookshop windows. Two highly successful writer/speakers who have managed to 'break through', two charming literary agents who receive over 300 submissions a month from aspirants and have to read them at weekends due to their workloads, one editor who only publishes crime and will only look at manuscripts from agents and another independent Bristol publisher, Strange Region, who publishes in his spare time. It is a fiercesome business! So many books are published and yet it is seems an almost impenetrable industry. Yes, I have a draft manuscript. I vacillate over what to do with it; between 'what have I got to lose by submitting it' to 'who on earth would want to read this book'? Should there be any progress, this blog will know!

The journey back was gloriously uneventful as the Storm had headed North. I meanwhile was transported to Svalbard in 1640 where events were certainly memorable and exceedingly cold in The Solitude of Thomas Cave by Georgina Harding. I was starting to shiver myself but then realised it was due to blasts of cold air in the carriage!

Also highly recommend Piranesi by Susanna Clarke which is completely unpredictable and engrossing. Lingering memories of the strange and wonderful world she has conjured.

My proudest moment in September was receiving my certificate for passing Level 2 Cornish at County Hall/Lys Kernow in the Council Chamber. Keslowena to everyone who passed especially those at Level 4 which is quite an achievement. Big thank you to our endlessly patient teacher Mark Trevethan. Classes have started again and true to form, I have forgotten everything over the summer …