We had planned to take a taxi as it was cheaper than a train plus bus, but our B&B host, Richard, was driving to St. Austell and offered to give us a ride as it was more or less on his way. So we saved some money and had some good conservation along the way....the B&B installed solar panels to generate electricity for the grid, and with government grants and 45p per kWh, they get a 17.5 % return on their investment per annum for 25 years.
The Eden Project is another project that has happened due to the vision of one person....he took a disused clay mine and created what is here today, with a lot of financial help.
The Eden Project is comprised of two domed areas (biomes) that are environmentally controlled to replicate a rain forest and a Mediterranean climate. The rainforest was 32.8 degrees celsius and 58 % humidity. Within each biome, there are boards describing challenges in these areas, such as deforestation, and what can be done about it. They have huge outdoor gardens and also sponsor sustainability projects. At the moment they are sponsoring a large display by Students Organizing for Sustainability (S.O.S.), about "Whole Earth? Aligning Human Systems and Natural Systems". This program aims to have students identify ways to make life more sustainable.
We ate lunch outside, and while we ate we watched a very good demonstration on pressing apples, presented by two of the Eden Project storytellers.
As we wandered through the outdoor exhibits, we watched people zip-lining across the top of the biomes. In the photograph below, the white dot at the top of the tree-line, between the 2 domes, is a person on the zip line.
We stayed at the Eden Project for about 5 hours and then decided to get a taxi home.....wrong! After 3 pm all the local taxis are doing school runs, with no taxis available until 5:30 pm or later. So we reverted to plan B, bus to St. Austell and then train back to Lostwithiel. At St. Austell railway station we saw a really old pedestrian overpass, built in 1882. Thankfully there is a brand new one at the other end of the platform.
We got back to Lostwithiel around 5:30 pm but the pub does not serve food until 6:30 pm, so we wandered around the churchyard to kill a little time. Being such an old town, and a former seat of Cornwall government, there were many old tombstones from the 1700s, but the oldest was an above ground vault from 1652, and still in amazing shape.
We ate dinner at the Globe Inn, talked about the highs (many) and lows (few) of our trip so far, and said our goodbyes to Randy and Marty, who leave tomorrow morning early for Portsmouth and places north.
From here on in, it is just the 2 of us.....
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