This column comes from Cornwall, the closest piece of England to the USA. It has been, historically, the UK's main supplier of metals to the world.
The Phoenicians came to these shores at the time of Christ, giving a commercial background to the legend that Joseph of Arimathea brought the body of Christ here. They came for tin, first found, according to legend, by St Piran, the patron saint of tinners. Underground tin mining started from about the fifteenth century with mines of 300 feet deep recorded by 1600.
The discovery of copper deposits in substantial quantities led to a peak of over 300 tin and copper mines. In the 1850's around two thirds of the world's copper came from Cornwall. The discovery of the metal in Australia, Zambia and the USA soon changed that.
The remnants of the mines which were called 'Wheals' are clearly visible and the spillings form ugly mini-mountains of yellow-brown around the stone chimneys. Only South Crofty is still worked although some others could be viable if the tin price improves.
As with the mines so with the fish. The pilchard, once the staple diet of comedians, both literally and figuratively, is no longer caught here. The move to trawling has forced fishermen to go further and further offshore to catch fish. The Spanish with their supposed fine mesh nets have hoovered up all the commercial catches. The Canadian flag flies from every local fishing boat to mark their affiliation with the stand made over the Spanish fishing in Canadian waters.
All that's left is farming. This takes three forms, dairy, arable and grockle.
Cornwall is famous for its cream, usually clotted and linked to a tea consisting of a wodge of the said cream, home made scones and home made strawberry jam-and a pot of tea of course. This cream is produced by the fantastically beautiful cows who stand guard on the skylines of the undulating pastures ruminating. The arable farming is EC driven; they grow the crops that pay the most. Thus the chrome yellow of Rape and the blue of Lucerne mingle with the conservative green turning to brown of wheat and barley. Incidentally, I have seen one very elegant wall made of local stone and earth, beautifully laid and turfed on the top. The main features of arable farming are the risk and the waiting. You prepare the land. You plant the crop. You wait. The quality and quantity of the crop is subject to the elements, the amount of rain and sunshine and the timing thereof. Then there is but a small space of time in which to harvest the crop and bring it in safely.
Grockle farming has the same anxieties. Grockles, the local name for visitors, tourists and holiday makers, are the major money making medium left to this lovely county. Weather and timing are all important. At Helston, the town made infamous by Terry Wogan's rendering of its theme folk song 'The Furry Dance', the manager of the Leisure Centre, where Mrs Fox, the expert on the Premier League and I were contesting a tense 18 holes on the excellent pitch and putt course, told me that the season was only six weeks long. Some would claim it's nearer twenty, but it is a very short time in which to produce the income for the whole year.
Cornwall has 100 documented beaches, varying between 3 miles of golden sands facing the Atlantic and a small rocky cove only accessible with the help of a support rope, making it unsuitable for all but the able bodied.
It has beautiful rivers especially the Helford, which can be navigated in its entirety at high tide. The range of pubs is mind boggling. No wonder King Arthur's Camelot is supposedly based at Tintagel Castle on the North Coast.
There is something for everyone and the locals have adapted to give their all to give the Grockles of whatever level of sophistication a great time.
For those of us who come from London, the pleasantness of the staff in pubs, shops and service stations is overwhelming. Only at Lands End, thanks to Peter de Savary a horrid hotch potch of commercialised crap, did we find the classic Brit barman. Serving alone, or rather not serving, a waiting crowd of twenty or so thirsty souls. When accosted, by me, on the merits of having the world's slowest barman serving alone, he muttered something about getting help but by then I was gonzo, in more ways than one.
To finish, I heard on the car radio one of the great quotes. The deaths of five Glaswegians all known to each other and their killers last weekend produced a statement from a local police chief, who, surprisingly spoke with a London accent. He explained that the only change from the normal level of violence in the City, which last year was the European Capital of Culture, was that the victims actually died rather than being committed to a long stay in hospital. He suggested that we should ignore the violence and said 'After all life must go on'. This should become the slogan of our BBC radio station Radio 5 Live.
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