Devon & Cornwall - Day 4

In a lush green field beside the A30 and not far from Exeter, a solitary deer raised its head. Seeming unperturbed by whatever had momentarily caught its attention, it returned to its grazing. A golden evening closed a blue day and became bronze. Extraordinary evening light washed across Devon and touched Axminster but dusk reached Dorset before I did, save for a few bronze beams against coast facing trees and Bridport lay in the pleasant mist of evening. A day as bright as yesterday was dull had heightened the senses. It made it possible to be grateful for almost everything.

Our decision to return home was fixed but a day of unbroken sunshine made it possible to linger along the way and to meander. It was still cold but our hearts were warmed by the light and everything seemed to be a photograph. We left Rosecare mid-morning and stopped soon at Otterham Station for another excellent breakfast at Piers Cafe. The sound of arriving motorbikes brought no peril; rather a sedate bunch of middle-aged men on a 'Sunday Out' and dangerously eating........bacon sandwiches. Presumably the one with the Norton was the non-conformist. I dabbled with Bodmin and conceded that Greg should get at least one shop for every ten railways/airports/bus stations etc.

On today's route that meant Trago Mills (near Liskeard). Trago Mills is an amalgam of retail styles and has the best bits of none. It is essentially a very large junk shop cum indoor boot sale and I am fairly sure that no-one actually knows why they go there. But they do so in their hundreds and thousands. This is the classic place to buy things you didn't know you wanted and to be convinced that you have saved money in doing so. There is a nasty undercurrent of overt nationalism at Trago, a bastion of UKIP and focal point for anyone vaguely anti-metric, anti-European or, possible anti anything that happened since 1750.

I never tire of crossing the Tamar Bridge with its view of the adjacent and remarkable  Brunel railway bridge. Thus to Plymouth where, I must admit, my enthusiasm waned a bit when I could not suck inspiration out of the  monolithic city centre war-damage replacement buildings. There must be much more to see but today was not the day to linger. Fortuitously our escape route took us past Laira, a name which encapsulates the glory of a railway which is no more. The depot is still large and, on a Sunday, is full of trains. In the UK we like to dramatically reduce the number of trains running on the one day when most people are free to travel.

With no script to work from I decided to go to Newton Abbot to meet a friend who works in CGI, a volatile industry. We met, pleasantly, nearer to Torquay and I was glad that our travels of last year had given us some knowledge of the area. And so, north via Exeter and then we sped across the south west to the accompaniment of the beautiful sights recorded above. It is so nice to go travelling but it's oh so lovely to come home.....

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