Sheila's Blog: The family summer holiday in Cornwall

Ice cream drips,

buckets and spades,

paddling in the waves.........

that's got to be the family summer holiday in Cornwall 2012.

The time spent on holiday is the most precious time of all with the people that mean everything in the world to you.

Sand in my shoes

Wave chasing in the shoreline

Sun-creamed bodies

Making a sand castle

Such an unspoilt coastline inspires Enid Blyton-style adventures.

The best sleep after all that sea air!

Our cottage was situated in the grounds of Duloe Manor to the south of the village of Dunloe, a little over three miles inland from the fishing village of Looe and it's large seagulls

Duloe Manor

Built in the late 1690s Duloe Manor is an imposing Queen Anne house, originally the rectory, it has a number of interesting historical associations - not least, with Alice, from Lewis Carroll's 'Alice in Wonderland'.

Anyone for Croquet on the lawn?

Chloe was the umpire

Alun enjoying the wonderful Cornish sun in the garden

Chloe enjoying a swing

while Emmie tidies the Wendy House

So lucky with the weather. Nanna in the outdoor pool

but Emmie and Chloe preferred the indoor pool.

Although it was lovely in the cottage, Cornwall has no shortage of things to do.

At the Monkey Sanctuary in Looe, we met a colony of Amazonian Woolly Monkeys.

The Sanctuary is home to monkeys rescued from lives of isolation and neglect - mainly from the UK primate pet trade.

A lovely atmosphere with talks by experienced staff.

Sorry no paparazzi shots of the monkeys.

Another great family day out was to Go Karting at Kartworld (www.KartworldCornwall.co.uk)

PL14 3PJ.

On an 800m track the family had the circuit to themselves.

Is that Caz in the lead?

It got quite exciting

Gemma always looks so glamourous, no matter what she wears.

Carrying a printout of her laptime. Big smile, must have been fast!

Guess who was the overall winner?

Granddad.

So it was off to a pub to celebrate:-

The Rashleigh, Polkerris - PL24 2TL. Located in an old lifeboat station beside the beach in a tiny cover at Polkerris, nr Daphne du Maurier's Menabilly home. This is a lovely pub for lunch in summer, so down a pint of real ale and then get ready to paddle....

The visit to Cornwall would not have been complete without sampling the taste of cider at Cornish Orchards, Duloe. Our neighbours.

Emmie inspected the apples

and decided we should taste and buy a large selection.

One of the best ways to see Cornwall is to cycle the Camel Trail.

We hired our bikes from Bike Smart at Eddystone Road, Wadebridge (01208) 814545.

Helmets and locks were supplied free of charge.

We did part of the Camel trail from Wadebridge to Padstow. The Camel trail is a disused railway line running parallel to the beautiful river Camel. It is traffic free, virtually flat the whole way (5 1/4 miles) and is probably the most scenic bike trail in the Country.

Miles of Smiles

The stunning views out over the Camel Estuary and Rock as seen from the Trail.

Even though Rick Stein is now rarely in Padstow (he lives mostly in Australia), this remains the aspirational place to eat fish and chips. So we locked our bikes at the end of the trail and headed into Padstow for fish and chips. And very good they were too.

We also did some shopping at our friend's shop, Shiva. Chris and Bianca have a lovely shop with lots of quirky seaside products and beautiful shells.

A memorable day out.

At the Bodmin and Wenford Railway we discovered the excitement and nostalgia of steam travel with a journey back in time on the only standard gauge (full size) railway in Cornwall operated by steam locomotives.