The day started with an after-breakfast walk down to the sea, with our B&B hostess, Mary. This was a walk that Mary had done many, many times with her children, and still does by herself. We might have had problems finding her route by ourselves, so we were doubly glad for her company. We very much enjoyed the hour or so of walking and visiting with her. The path led down to St. Loy's Cove, which we had crossed on our coastal walk two days before.

Mary talked about her childhood, when her father worked for Trinity House. He had been part of the team making food for the lighthouse keepers. She had sometimes ridden along in the boats taking supplies to the lighthouses, and had liked that.

As we started off driving, we went through the nearest village, St. Buryan. The road sign in front of the church, at the one intersection, showed many of the places we had begun to become familiar with. Logan Rock refers to a place on the coast, where there had been an 70-ton boulder that was perfectly balanced, such that one could move it with a slight touch. But in 1824, Oliver Goldsmoth's nephew, with some fellow sailors, knocked it off its perch. They were made to replace it (at tremendous effort and expense), but it no longer rocks.

We were on our way to the Geevor Tin Mine, which closed in 1990, one of the last mines in Cornwall to close. It's been fixed up for visitors, for us to learn about the tin mines and what it was like to work in them, and the process of sorting and extracting tin. We put on the required hard hats for the building tour, and then added smocks for the underground tour.

Next we drove a few miles to Madron Moor, for a walk to see some of the many archaeological remains in the area. There are stone circles, standing stones, and burial sites. The first stop on the walk was at Men-an-Tol, a Bronze Age (or possibly Stone Age) site. One of the stones has a hole. Holed stones always are claimed to have healing powers, and in this case one has to go through nine times. Two of the women who had arrived just before us were Cornish, and felt moved by the mystical spirits of the place. I went through the hole once, for fun, but as we left we looked back and saw this woman very seriously and slowly crawling through, over and over.

We saw Men-Scryfa standing stone and the Nine Maidens stone circle as we crossed the moor, on our way to Ding Dong mine. (You can see it in the distance in the photo above, and in fact from much of the moor.)

Ding Dong mine probably got its present name from the sound of church bells across the moor, but it's an ancient mine. It's said to have been visited by Jesus when he accompanied his uncle, Joseph of Arimathea, to Britain! The derelict engine house is 19th century.

The term "quoit" is used in Cornwall for megalithic burial mounds, massive capstones resting on upright stones, no longer with the original soil covering. Lanyon Quoit was the next stop on our walk, and Ding Dong engine house was still visible.

We decided to go back to the coast and do a short walk among the old mine workings. The Three Crowns mine engine houses near Botallack are a dramatic sight.

Everywhere in the area one sees the remains of now disused mines, with signs warning of "old mine workings." The lighthouse below,at the right, is the Pendeen Watch.

We drove to nearby St. Just, to have dinner at the pub, the King's Arms. This picture in the town center car park seems to have many "typical" aspects:

The inn's name, the King's Arms is much used:		and there's the red phone box in front:
	and the church tower above everything else
	and a traffic jam in the car park, with a young woman trying to help out:

For dinner I had mushroom and nut fettucini, a typical item on the vegetarian entree list. And typically, a very friendly man came over to talk with us. He told us of his good fortune; some months ago a Canadian couple had been visiting in the area and had had a car accident. This man had helped them out, and now he had just gotten a letter from the Canadians, inviting him to an all-expenses-paid visit to them in Canada. He was very happy!

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