Angie the Emmet

The Cornish (some of them, that is... well actually, quite a lot of them) have a none-too-endearing name for visitors; they call them emmets.  'Emmet' is a Cornish dialect word that means 'ant'. If you've even seen Newquay's Tolcarne Beach on a warm summer day, densely populated by visitors who are turning lobster-red in the sunshine, you'll understand the term perfectly.

In a little over a fortnight's time I will be a visitor in Cornwall — yes, an emmet.  To add to the ignominy, I shall be staying in a hotel in Newquay.  "What's wrong with that?" I hear all two of my regular readers exclaim.  Well, I grew up in a hotel on the outskirts of Newquay and for many years S- managed one. Now I'm going to pay someone else to stay in one. Oh the shame of it! 

Except that I'm actually looking forward to it. In my humble opinion, Newquay has descended from being a top-class holiday resort to a bit of a dump since my childhood, but towns rarely stay the same for long, and it a trait of the elderly to hanker after the past.  The beaches, I know, will be as spectacular as ever and it will be fun to seek out headlands and caves where I once played, and where my children played after me.

Sadly, I have very few photos of Newquay. This one, rescued from a fading colour slide, dates from my teenage years. Until digital photography came along, cameras were for holidays, so there are far more photos in my collection of North Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Austria and Crete, than of my home town. That's something that I'm definitely going to correct on this holiday.