Cornish Van Life
3 Nights exploring Cornwall in a classic VW Camper
Last week we rented a camper and set off to explore some Cornish (Kernow) beauty. After picking up the VW Camper near Bodmin we headed twenty minutes down the road to our first stop, a place I’ve wanted to visit for a while now, Nancarrow Farm.
Delicious food, there own beer and beautiful rusty barn set over an amazing site. We went for the Farm Supper on a Wednesday evening and it didn’t disappoint. Utterly fell in love with this farm and will definitely be returning. We strolled around and explored the grounds, through the vegetable gardens and orchards before grabbing our farm box full of an incredible 3 course meal. We found ourselves a little outdoor bench and sat listening to a local musician, Tom Dale as we tucked into our supper. We also picked up a bottle of their own Pink Elderflower Gin which is amazing.
After our first night in the camper headed straight to the coast hoping for sunshine, however we greed with moody skies and rainfall. Although it wasn’t nice enough to sit on the beach and go belly boarding we still had a great time, listing to the rain beat on the roof of the camper with a hot cup of tea and views of the dramatic yet moody coastline. We picked up the coastline at Trevaunance Cove and then headed south through the National Trust area of Godrevy all the way to Gwithian Beach where we parked up a took a short still. We watched the surfers and saw a pod of dolphins playing in the sea. From here we headed around St Ives Bay and into St Ives where we took a cultural trip around Tate St ives art gallery. Bellies rumbling we headed in search of lunch, which had to of course be a Cornish Pasty (Which by the way was amazing) and we also grabbed some baked goodness from St Ives Bakery, we took a stroll around the town but it was a little too busy to enjoy so we escaped earlier than planned and headed from the north coast down to the south coast for our second night.
We found a wicked little pub called The Halzephron Inn which is near Gunwalloe where we ate and they kindly said we could sleep in the car park which was great. I also had the best Sea Bass! From here it was just a short drive south in the Lizard Peninular and to our next destination, Kynance Cove. Kynance always feels like Dartmoor meets the Caribbean to me and I absolutely love this place. It was close to high tide when we arrived so there wasn’t any beach but we took a stroll down to the Cove which takes about 10/20 minutes and enjoyed a coffee from the café as we watched the waves crashing against the rocks. As the rain started to fall we headed back up to the van overlooking the coastline and tucked into those delicious baked good we picked up in St Ives. Kynance Cove is a National Trust car park with lots of room but it’s a popular tourist spot so make sure you get there early, it’s also not cheap. It was £7.50 for the day which wasn’t bad for us as we planned to make a day out of it. So when we got back into the van we read, played board games and drank tea as the rain came and went. Kynance Cove looks it’s best at low tide so we weren’t in any rush, In fact in the early evening we made the 10 minute trip to Lizard to pick up some fish and chips for tea and waited as the tide retreated back to the sea.
After devouring our tea we took one last stroll to the cliff opposite Kynance Cove and were rewarded with an amazing view of the golden sand and dramatic coastline even the clouds parted for last light. The dry skies didn’t last too long and before we knew it we had to make a mad dash back to the van. We decided to stay close by to Kynance so we could enjoy the evening and it was already getting dark. We saw a field between Kynance Cove and Lizard which offered over night stays for £10 so we decided to give it a try. It was a huge open field with plenty of room so we found a flat spot, popped up the roof and set up for a night of games and wine.
On our final morning (Lucy’s Birthday) we woke up early for the traditional chorus of Happy Birthday and the opening ceremony of cards and present which for the past 3 days I’d spent moving around the van in order to keep them hidden, I’m not sure how successful that was. We took some final photographs of the camper and hit the road. The trip back to Bodmin was due to take about an hour however at no quicker than 40mph and only 4 gears we arrived back at the drop off point in about 2 hours. We said our goodbye’s to the VW Camper and #VanLife and handed the keys back.
I’ve you’ve never rented a camper I highly recommend it, we had such a great time even if the weather wasn’t great. If you have a camper then I’m enormously jealous of you and hope one day we’ll have a camper of our own for more adventures.