For the third year running, Richard 74’s Treasure Hunt from Stithian’s Lake café was great fun, with some even more devious questions – go too fast and you miss them! The 15 mile route took us north of Stithians, around Carharrack, through Trevarth, Busveal and Gwennap, with two stops at the Fox and Hounds at Comfort, where some of the approximately twenty members taking part, stopped off for refreshments.
The questions varied from finding numbers on telegraph poles (a popular one) to dates on tomb stones, the weight limit for a weak bridge, and the total mileage on three road signs at a crossroads. The ‘South African estate agents cottage’ was ‘Kimberly’ of course! spotted on the way to Carharrack, and WROCFORT was ‘Croft Row’ – one of the few we didn’t get, having reckoned that Richard wouldn’t be so mean as to include an anagram! The route past Gwennap Pit was new to most of us, which made it extra interesting – along with questions about Gwennap Church; it has a detached bell tower, in common with Illogan and Gunwalloe – perfect for future Cornish quizzes – you learn a lot from these treasure hunts! The cryptic questions kept coming; ‘Would Winston leave his mutt here?’ At Churchill Boarding Kennels near Lanner. Letter boxes painted blue are now out of use, and ‘Bre Howldrevol’ is Cornish for ‘Sunrise Hill’.
Five of us cycled as a group, which was just as well as we were down to one pen – Paula, Sheila, Denise, Jo and myself. It was great to have Denise with us on her snazzy new electric bike, perfect for anyone who needs a bit of help up the hills, for reasons of health or age. We were a bit concerned that Denise might run out of battery power before she got home, as we seemed to find a hill at every turn, but all was well. So it was back to Stithians Lake, where we put our £2 vouchers towards our chosen food and drink, replacing the saffron buns this year. Richard checked all our answers and announced that Fred was the winner by one point…
Thanks again to Richard for setting yet another wonderful Treasure Hunt; his many hours of work preparing the route and the questions was really appreciated.
Liz