ABOVE MOUSEHOLE

In our conversations with people, we heard of a little village just a short walk away called Paul!  So, off we went up a narrow two-lane road that in places was hardly wide enough for a car to pass the two of us without forcing us either into a hedge or a stone wall!

Along the way there was no shortage of picturesque scenes of the farmland we passed.  I loved this old barn!  

Paul is just a small community of less than 300 inhabitants, but there in the middle of the quaint homes was St Pol de Leon's Anglican church!  What a stately old building! A church has been in the village since the fifth century, but this tower was constructed in the 1400's.  After the Spaniards destroyed much of the building, it was rebuilt by 1600.  Beautiful music was coming from inside!  A youth orchestra was practicing for a future performance. It was such a serendipity moment.

 

After listening for a while, we made our way out to explore more of the little village.  Beside the church, a man was doing some stonework restoring a nearby building's exterior.  We stopped to chat.  He was an expert in restoration.  He gave us some lessons in the proper mix of a limestone mortar to fill in the spaces between the stones.  It sounded like tuck pointing to me, but he quickly said that tuck-pointing was something else altogether!  What he was doing allowed moisture to escape, and the building to breathe.  Tuck-pointing used concrete and damaged the structure.  My mistake!  What a time-consuming task!  

Before heading back to Mousehole, we had to take a moment at the only business in the village - a pub!  We chatted with a couple of customers in the pub including a local farmer who raised cattle and some vegetables on the beautiful fields around Paul.  Our conversation had barely started when he suddenly got a call and quickly handed his dog's leash to Mary Ann and asked her to watch his dog for a bit!  We just hoped he had plans to return soon!  He did, and we stayed to talked some more.  Just as we were about to leave, he called after us and said:  "Whatever you do on the remainder of your vacation, be sure to GO SLOW!"  Great advice from a new Cornish friend.