Boscastle at Christmas

So that afternoon (back to Christmas) we decided we would pop over and see what progress has been made in Boscastle after the terrible flood in 2004 that devastated the town a few years ago...

Not a huge amount has changed, it somehow felt like the car park was higher up (although it could have been my imagination), but there was a perfectly tangible new huge chunky wall on the river bank -

- (next to a brand spanking new toilet block) -

- flood defences have been drastically improved before the original bridge -

- (comparison shot from 2006) -

- and the channel past the bridge has been significantly widened and deepened -


- (comparison) -

- there is a brand new visitors centre -


- and a nice new bridge (which is extremely low profile) to help prevent build up, as the old one acted something like a dam when 14 floating cars got caught up under it -

- everything (largely) appears to be back to normality in the village (still one or two buildings under construction, incredibly) -

- and the odd paranoid sandbag lingers (as there was a mini repeat performance in June 2007) -

- but, as I noted before, there is simply no going back to the well matured, charmingly scruffy feel of the Boscastle of yore...a shame, especially as this was very far from the first time such an event has taken place (records date back to 1847)...it almost feels like securing the portal when the quadruped has already scarpered... :(

Cornwall update - Boscastle

So, August 26th (Saturday) saw us take a drive to Boscastle. It's been a while since I've been back (it was a total mess last time I was there, only about 2 shops open) since "The Flood" and seeing it from the top of the rise it suddenly becomes abundantly clear quite what an area of land was available to the storm...plenty to drown that tiny little valley, in fact, seeing it again in context it's incredible that it hasn't happened before (or since), quite honestly... :0

...it's strange, but wandering the streets now, it looks like a clone of the original, the same, but somehow not...it's been rebuilt (in fact there are still bulding sites around the place) to look the same as it did, but the effect that time had on the buildings has been lost, so it's interesting from the point of view of seeing what Boscastle may have been like when it was first established as a fishing community I guess...

..of course there are still a couple of fishing boats in the harbour -

- and some evidence of lobster catching (at least) -

- but the towns income is largely based on the tourist trade (bolstered, ironically by the flood that wiped the charming buildings into the sea) -

- we climbed the cliffs, but I get terribly nervous on scree covered, slippery, narrow paths that meander irresponsibly close to precipitous chasm and sharp rock far, far below...(so the visit was fleeting)...
That evening I tried a different steak in the clubhouse, this time asking for "Medium Rare", and, well, judge for yourself... ;)