The wonderfully unique Clovelly from its harbour wall, Devon, England.
Commentary.
What can be said about Clovelly?
Unique, special, memorable, charming, fantastic.
No description quite suffices,
no image captures all its qualities and ambience.
The path from above winds through broadleaf woods,
clinging on to the cliffs.
Suddenly, rooftops and chimney stacks break the green swathe, like card-board cut-outs in a pop-up book.
Cottages appear, as in a fairy-story in this surreal cleft,
a mini-gorge, a chyne-like cranny.
A cobbled, twisted path wends its way down, in broad steps.
It passes a plethora of old, quaint, gabled, tumbledown cottages festooned with window-boxes, flower-pots and small, neat beds of cultivated, wrought-ironed gardens.
Guesthouse, small hotel accommodation, ice-cream and gift shops proliferate to appease the throngs of summer tourists that brave the steep walk.
Such photogenic qualities belies the hard struggle to survive
that fishermens’ families endured in former centuries.
As with St.Ives in Cornwall, Clovelly now enjoys a world-class
credential in its magical position in relation to the sea,
a place so wonderful, may it never be spoiled.
The wonderfully unique Clovelly from its harbour wall, Devon, England.
Commentary.
What can be said about Clovelly?
Unique, special, memorable, charming, fantastic.
No description quite suffices,
no image captures all its qualities and ambience.
The path from above winds through broadleaf woods,
clinging on to the cliffs.
Suddenly, rooftops and chimney stacks break the green swathe, like card-board cut-outs in a pop-up book.
Cottages appear, as in a fairy-story in this surreal cleft,
a mini-gorge, a chyne-like cranny.
A cobbled, twisted path wends its way down, in broad steps.
It passes a plethora of old, quaint, gabled, tumbledown cottages festooned with window-boxes, flower-pots and small, neat beds of cultivated, wrought-ironed gardens.
Guesthouse, small hotel accommodation, ice-cream and gift shops proliferate to appease the throngs of summer tourists that brave the steep walk.
Such photogenic qualities belies the hard struggle to survive
that fishermens’ families endured in former centuries.
As with St.Ives in Cornwall, Clovelly now enjoys a world-class
credential in its magical position in relation to the sea,
a place so wonderful, may it never be spoiled.