LE JOG

[Sweder]

I tripped yet further northward, leaving the balmy delights of Harlyn Bay, running through the charming village of Treator and on into Padstow. I've been looking forward to stopping by Rick Stein's Seafood Café ever since reading Arabella Weir's review in the Guardian. Stein owns and operates no less than five eateries in the region; I'd stopped by to watch the St. Merryn locals imbibe joyfully at his craftily-named Cornish Arms a few nights back. Stein is well known to BBC viewers as Mr Seafood, less engaging if no less authorititive a TV Chef than the incomporable Keith Floyd, sadly lost to his many fans last September.

I'm not sure why I'm loathed to love Stein. Perhaps it's my staunch allegiance to the maverick, Stranglers-and-wine-loving Floyd, or possibly the fact that try as he might to be an Everyman Stein has the air of a man with a dark secret. There are murmerings in these parts about Sopranoesque business practices, bullying over the purchase of local property and the inexorable expansion of the Stein Empire. All I'm really after is a mouthful of Monkfish and a kiss of something light, cold and creamy to wash it down.

After indulging my passion for fresh seafood I lumbered along to North Quay where, in terms of this Homeric journey, I cheated. Well, I took the Rock Ferry across the Camel estuary. My choice of shortcut was not simply to save on shoe leather; lord knowns I've taken a far from linear approach to this challenge already. I rather fancied a brisk skip across the bay, a chance to drink in the intoxicatingly beautiful scenery, to gaze upon Padstow from the water and to make use of a form of transport that shares its name with a Duffy album.



Disembarking in the gloom of dusk I set off inland, seeking lodgings. I didn't want to go too far, yet I was disappointed at the dearth of obviously welcoming (or, indeed, open) hostilries to be found in Rock. As the fates would have it I ran a further two miles north into Port Isaac, most recently in the public eye (what is it with these Cornish villages?) as host to the Martin Clunes vehicle, Doc Martin. Well after dark the temperature had dropped dramatically; luckily I found - would you believe it - another Cornish Arms. This far more modest establishment does not boast the support of a prolific celebrity chef, or even offer itself as the backdrop to a television drama. It does however offer very reasonable B&B within its qaint, slightly cramped 16th Century bossom and boasts a shining 2009 endorsement from CAMRA.
Not that I'm interested in that just at the moment.