The Cornwall Blog

From Heart to Stereo are playing in Wadebridge on the 1st of November at the Swan Hotel in the centre of town. An excellent band playing very imaginative covers and originals. This video does not do them justice at all, well worth coming down to see for yourself. The set list has a surprising amount of classic eighties tracks in it for a band in their early twenties, showing a musical maturity. It is also very refreshing to see these numbers performed with the energy of this extremely tight three piece.

Last week I mentioned that Padstow Contemporary Art Gallery was opening its Autumn Exhibition, and last Friday evening attended the private viewing. There was a warm atmosphere within the small exhibition space, welcoming as we stepped in from the crisp Autumn darkness. All the design team from Pickle Design attended, eager to see John O'Carroll's new work alongside regular exhibitors to his gallery. The featured image in this post is called Damascus by Gareth Edwards, and is hung upstairs. His work in the lower gallery evokes the Camel Estuary, and the choice of media gives it the impression that it has formed from the boatyards and sands wonderfully. Simon Gaiger's sculpture draws on nautical mythology, especially memorable in the piece Charybdis, based on the spokes of a carriage wheel, and effortlessly conjuring images of the Greek sea monster.

Padstow Contemporary Art Gallery is opening its Autumn 2008 Exhibition next Saturday, the 18th October. It features work by Gareth Edwards, Simon Gaiger , and, of course, John O'Carroll , the resident artist and curator. John also has another exhibition running in Holland, Archaiologia, at Galerie Roger Katwijk . This is where, in a few weeks, he will be presenting his new book cataloguing his work from the last ten years. Padstow Contemporary Art Gallery is located in an atmospheric alleyway in the centre of the town, and is open from 11am to 5pm daily, and 11am to 1pm on Sunday. The image above is "Grey Wing" by Simon Gaiger.

My father in law is always telling me what goes on in Camelford, and, frankly, I didn’t really take much notice as it seemed to be out on a limb. But I went along and took a few photographs and was amazed by the architecture there. It really does have a lot of potential. The Tourist Information Centre supplied us with some details and history of the town and my wife put them together to make a Town Guide on the Eye on Cornwall website. If you are looking for more information on the town, drop into North Cornwall Museum, where the Tourist Information Centre is based.

Devon and Cornwall Film are running a competition for film makers in the South West to celebrate the Free Cinema Movement's 50th anniversary. They focus on the void that is quality cinema down here in the far west. If you are struggling to cope with the vacuous blockbusters and need some mental stimulation, take a look at their web site.

There has been a boom in businesses offering cycle hire as more and more people look to healthy options for their holiday entertainment. Ski resorts push mountain biking as soon as the snow starts to trickle away in the swelling streams, and it is not just adrenaline sports fans that take the headlong trip any more. There is an ever increasing number of families looking for excitement in this way. There may not be mountains in the South West, but there are a great number of companies that provide bikes to travel over the largely untamed landscape. A lot of these are based on existing cycle trails such as Trail Bike Hire on the Camel Trail near Padstow, but some now delve into the moors with mountain bike leaders. Coupled with cycle hire, this is a very convenient way to edge out of our individual comfort zones. The very factor that puts many off cycling in South West, the hilly terrain, can be the most attractive reason to make the extra effort. Fitness is not the only concern, there ...

We are very much in the main season here in Cornwall, the beaches are packed and the streets are full of slow moving tourists looking at the view - murder when you are trying to get to work in the morning! My wife gets very angry when it is so busy, as do many locals, but considering the tourist industry is the largest source of income in the South West, I have a more ambivalent view. There are many plus points to such an influx of visitors to a relatively small area, the sudden boost to the local economy not being the least important, but the season has become progressively forced into a tight time period year on year. One factor contributing to this has been the new policy for schools to penalise children that take holidays during term time. This has meant that parents will only go away during the six weeks school break, and are not able to take advantage of, perhaps, a short heat wave. The effect of this reduced season also means ridiculously expensive prices for the two months of h...