A whale had been seen in Mount’s Bay, not far from here, in the days before we went on this walk. So, along this three-mile stretch of the South West Coast Path, we kept an eye to the left on the way out, and an eye to the right on the way back. Just in case.
But of course we didn’t see a whale. We never see a whale. Not even a dolphin. And certainly not a basking shark. Ah well … another disappointing walk.
This was the day when those words were first spoken and the idea for Another Disappointing Walk came to us.
No, we hadn’t seen the whale – or a basking shark – but we’d meandered down from the National Trust car park high above Rinsey Cove to Praa Sands where you have plenty of time while walking the mile-long beach to ponder: can you get house insurance when half your garden fence is hanging over a rapidly eroding dune? And how exactly do you say Praa?
We’d wondered what the cabbage-like plants dotting the edge of the path towards Prussia Cove were and later discovered they were … well … cabbages. Wild ones.
Perched cautiously on the cove’s serrated rocks to eat our lunch, we’d watched a grey seal bobbing off the shore and the tide inching closer to a sleeping, cravat-toting gentleman dressed as if he had stepped straight out of a seaside-themed episode of Poirot.
And I’d had an encounter with a bumblebee that was surprising, a little violating and ultimately educational.
It hoved into view from some distance: a growing dark blob rhythmically riding the air towards me in the way the smugglers’ boats of long ago must have approached this cove on the rolling waves. They would have set their course for the caves bored into the cliff, just as this bee had its sights trained on another tiny cavern.
At first I thought my cheese sandwich was what had attracted the bee, but it ignored my snack and, like a clumsy potholer, scuffed and scratched its way into my right nostril.
“Arghh, there’s a bee up my nose!” I shouted, hopping and swiping at my face as cheddar and crust scattered the ground.
Soon it realised this wasn’t the hideaway it had hoped for and – with no apology – buzzed off along the coast.
I might have been lucky to escape unscathed. Michael Smith, an American student focusing on the behaviour of honeybees, once discovered the nostril is the worst place to be stung by a bee.
In a triumph of scientific adventure over common sense, he allowed himself to be stung all over the body (yes, even there ...) and rated the pain on a scale of one to ten. Being stung in the nostril – “a whole-body experience” apparently – scored nine. At least the only sting I felt was to my pride.
So, after all, there’s really no such thing as a disappointing walk.
Basking sharks seen on this walk: 0
Total basking sharks seen to date: 0