Camel rides in Cornwall.

Ok, my attempt at crafting an eye-catching title maybe somewhat lame. Even so, 'Camel', lame or otherwise, seems a very odd name for a river in Cornwall, like discovering a small tributary in the Nile delta called the Pasty. In fact Camel is an anglicised adaptation of the Cornish word for 'winding' - Kammel. It does lead you to wonder if other places names in England such as Cambridge or Cambourne  also have Celtic roots. 

However, it is true - the reason why we are heading towards a campsite near Wadebridge does have to do with the rides on offer hereabouts. The Camel Trail is a disused railway which follows the eponymous river for 16 miles or so, from the former china clay village of Wenford Bridge to Padstow, a small fishing port situated near the mouth of the estuary. Having recently declared the Mawdach Trail in Gwynedd the best short cycle trail in the world it will be interesting to see how its Cornish cousin compares. 

That's our plan for tomorrow, what I need to do is to have another glass of the luscious pinot gris from Alsace that Gill found earlier on deal in Bodmin Morrison's. I feel frazzled, the journey here was not traumatic, more attritional, a quiet accumulation of slightly stressful moments. There were traffic jams in Stoke-on-Trent, queues at the the M6/M5 junction, and the motorways were busy all the way from Staffordshire to Somerset. It took almost twice as long to reach our overnight stop near Burnham-on-Sea than Google maps estimated.  

Given our chosen resting place was a  Caravan and Motorhome Club site my expectations were modest,  I just knew the place would annoy me. I was not disappointed. I appreciate that Weston-super-Mare is a complete dump, after all in 2015 Banksy chose an abandoned amusement park in the town as the location for 'Dismaland'. 

What I had failed to fully appreciated is the extent of the 'hi-di-hi sprawl' that stretches south of the town towards Burnham-on-Sea. Mid-way between the two is Brean Pontins surrounded by equally ghastly static caravan parks and faded visitor attractions. The entire area is a monument to our national pride in the overtly naff. A nearby petting zoo calls itself Animal Farm, its blurb asserting, seemingly oblivious to the irony, that it had been operating since 1984.

Sequestered within the Kingdom of Candy Floss is a small enclave of bourgeois sensibility,  Hurn Lane Caravan Club site is predictably bungaloid, frequented mainly by caravanners with spotless SUVs sporting small St. George badges on their ample rear ends. A.F.T. I decided, the first letter signifying 'all' and the final one 'Tories'. I leave the middle consonant to your imagination; a hint, it does not denote 'friendly'. Inevitably the place was comically overmanaged  by some ex-scout leader who I suspect in his spare time carefully curates a Facebook group called the Captain Mainwaring Appreciation Society.

All went well until we came to leave next morning. Given its dismal location the place was surprisingly busy. We had opted for a particularly undesirable pitch, opposite the sanitary block and about 30 yards from the entrance. We figured it would allow us to make a swift exit next morning. Sadly, I had not studied the site plan thoughtfully provided when we booked in, so I inadvertently ignored the strict one way system and headed straight towards the nearby exit barrier. This prompted the camp gruppenführer to leap from his sentry box as if about to announce the imminent arrival of a tsunami in the Bristol Channel. "Turn around! Turn around!" he exclaimed, making a peculiar whirligig gesture with his left arm with his right pointing straight forward, palm outwards like Mr. Plod directing traffic. It became obvious straightaway that performing a three point turn was in fact far more hazardous than simply letting me through. It must have grieved him immensely to allow my transgression, though he did make a noble attempt to re-assert his authority by snatching the barrier card from Gill as she stood by the gate, "We don't want any accidents now do we?" he observed in a tone usually reserved for a feral seven year old  caught surreptitiously experimenting with matches. Brave guy I thought to myself, Gill is not someone who suffers fools gladly.

As we headed south down the M5 towards Taunton  small gaggles of climate activists had gathered on the bridges. 'Fossil Fuels Drive Climate Change' read one of the small signs dangling over the motorway. It  seemed like a very polite, unobtrusive kind of protest. 

Though I was pleased not to be delayed, really for their message to cut through small demonstrations are never going to work. Only outrageous stunts and big disruptions ever hit the headlines. Extinction Rebellion were gathered here because the leaders of the 'free world's biggest economies were heading to a hotel near St. Ives for the G7 summit. When we planned our trip we were completely oblivious to the fact that it coincided with the event. 

As it happened we were largely unaffected by it, only the area around Newquay and St. Ives suffered major disruption; where we were due to stay near Wadebridge was more than 25 miles from the conference and it's attendant media scrum. Still, we were buzzed on the A30 by a convoy of black windowed Land Rovers surrounded by police motorcyclists, two squad cars, and an equally blacked-out Mercedes mini-bus, carrying the security services presumably. As they swept past in the fast lane one of the police cars cut in front of us to protect the occupants of the black landrovers from the risk of a terrorist attack from radicalised grey haired motorhomers. We decided the convoy probably contained royals as Charles, Camilla, William and Kate were all due to meet various members of the G7. So far as the leaders were concerned, Johnson and Biden had already arrived and the others were not due until tomorrow.

Aside from our phones being assailed by ludicrous publicity shots of Boris and Carrie looking awkward with the Bidens, and the world leaders socially distancing on a beach, our only other brush with the momentous events unfolding nearby occurred in the checkout queue of Bodmin Morrisons. The woman in front of us explained that her grandson had been photographed with Boris Johnson when he visited Wadebridge School yesterday. She added that she couldn't stand the man, the checkout operator agreed, adding that what the PM really needed was a decent haircut. It struck us on our arrival at the campsite that had we arrived a day earlier we too might have had an uncomfortably close shave with the PM. The site was less than half a mile from Wadebridge school, down the same narrow lane. I presume Prime Ministerial visits results local gridlock. 

As it was, our arrival would have been perfectly easy had I not sailed past the campsite entrance. The lanes of Cornwall are notoriously narrow, it was two miles further on before I found somewhere to run around, even then it involved reversing into an unmetalled track while Gill watched for traffic. As I said, getting here - no big dramas but a 'a quiet accretion of slightly stressful moments'. 

Still, the site is nice, friendly and relaxed, the forecast for the next few days fabulously warm and sunny and we have a Camel ride to look forward to tomorrow.  All is good, ish.