We have just spent a very pleasant weekend down in Cornwall, visiting friends and family from Australia who are on holiday at the moment.
It was an interesting weekend for me, as I lived in Cornwall for six months about a million years ago. I was surprised to find that parts of my brain are still clogged up with geographical knowledge of an area I have not visited in many years.
This knowledge isn't particularly useful for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, it manifests itself in the form of strong hunches, rather than a SatNav overview. An example: Turning the corner with an overwhelming confidence that there will be a watermill followed by a viaduct. It's rather like having a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle scattered randomly across the carpet of my brain.
Secondly, there have been quite a lot of changes over the last fifteen years, so there is no guarantee that the watermill will still be around the corner. Imagine someone has drawn a different picture in magic marker on half of the jigsaw pieces (why do my analogies always end up so unwieldy?).
We did get to spend a day in Padstow, including a very nice meal in a Bistro owned by the ubiquitous Mr. Rick Stein. The food was really excellent, some of the best fish I have ever had. I had fantastic sardines with a tomato, mint and caper salad, followed by haddock with a sauce verte with butter beans and the tiniest hint of fresh chili, a fantastic combination which leaves me salivating just thinking about it.
That said, I did find something a little unsettling about the way that Padstow is so dominated by the Stein. There's a restaurant, a bistro, a cafe and a fish and chip shop, as well as a deli.
Unfortunately, there is not much in the way of accessible shopping in the harbourfront area, with all the shops having a least two steps, no drop kerbs on the paved areas, and cars trying to negotiate the one way system. Add to the mix large sections of unfenced drops into the harbour and a busy day becomes a wheelchair skills challenge with very high stakes.
Obviously, I relish such adversity, but it's certainly wouldn't be much fun for many people. It's a shame that such an obviously successful town can't put at least some of the revenue into simple access solutions that could be subtle and cerainly not very expensive.
And I know just which bit of the revenue they could use, for on this trip, I came across my favourite wheelchair sign to date...
The sign was accompanied with the explanation that the Harbour Commissioners were 'unable to offer' parking charge exemptions to Blue Badge holders. Unable to offer suggests,
"We'd really love to. Honestly. I was saying to Presuming Ed just last week how much joy it would bring to able to offer such and exemption. But then THE MAN came and hassled us, dude, and it all got really heavy. Fight the power."
I suspect there is a little more of a we're unable to because of all the money we can make by charging blue badge holders.
I would like to make one thing clear... I don't mind paying. Especially if there are alternatives that I have chosen not to use, but when we enquired about the ferry from the other side of the estuary, the harbourmaster in Rock was very unhelpful, and the tidal nature of the river means that at tdifferent times the ferry may or may not involve steps and a soft sandy beach.
But here's the best bit... The afforementioned sign was in the Rock Quarry carpark (also run by the Padstow harbourmaster), which also has no dispensation for blue badge holders. And surely there are more diplomatic ways of getting the point across:
It was an interesting weekend for me, as I lived in Cornwall for six months about a million years ago. I was surprised to find that parts of my brain are still clogged up with geographical knowledge of an area I have not visited in many years.
This knowledge isn't particularly useful for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, it manifests itself in the form of strong hunches, rather than a SatNav overview. An example: Turning the corner with an overwhelming confidence that there will be a watermill followed by a viaduct. It's rather like having a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle scattered randomly across the carpet of my brain.
Secondly, there have been quite a lot of changes over the last fifteen years, so there is no guarantee that the watermill will still be around the corner. Imagine someone has drawn a different picture in magic marker on half of the jigsaw pieces (why do my analogies always end up so unwieldy?).
We did get to spend a day in Padstow, including a very nice meal in a Bistro owned by the ubiquitous Mr. Rick Stein. The food was really excellent, some of the best fish I have ever had. I had fantastic sardines with a tomato, mint and caper salad, followed by haddock with a sauce verte with butter beans and the tiniest hint of fresh chili, a fantastic combination which leaves me salivating just thinking about it.
That said, I did find something a little unsettling about the way that Padstow is so dominated by the Stein. There's a restaurant, a bistro, a cafe and a fish and chip shop, as well as a deli.
Unfortunately, there is not much in the way of accessible shopping in the harbourfront area, with all the shops having a least two steps, no drop kerbs on the paved areas, and cars trying to negotiate the one way system. Add to the mix large sections of unfenced drops into the harbour and a busy day becomes a wheelchair skills challenge with very high stakes.
Obviously, I relish such adversity, but it's certainly wouldn't be much fun for many people. It's a shame that such an obviously successful town can't put at least some of the revenue into simple access solutions that could be subtle and cerainly not very expensive.
And I know just which bit of the revenue they could use, for on this trip, I came across my favourite wheelchair sign to date...
The sign was accompanied with the explanation that the Harbour Commissioners were 'unable to offer' parking charge exemptions to Blue Badge holders. Unable to offer suggests,
"We'd really love to. Honestly. I was saying to Presuming Ed just last week how much joy it would bring to able to offer such and exemption. But then THE MAN came and hassled us, dude, and it all got really heavy. Fight the power."
I suspect there is a little more of a we're unable to because of all the money we can make by charging blue badge holders.
I would like to make one thing clear... I don't mind paying. Especially if there are alternatives that I have chosen not to use, but when we enquired about the ferry from the other side of the estuary, the harbourmaster in Rock was very unhelpful, and the tidal nature of the river means that at tdifferent times the ferry may or may not involve steps and a soft sandy beach.
But here's the best bit... The afforementioned sign was in the Rock Quarry carpark (also run by the Padstow harbourmaster), which also has no dispensation for blue badge holders. And surely there are more diplomatic ways of getting the point across:
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