Cornish Pasty Blog

On the train once again

I kind of miss my train rides that had become a regular part of my commute. With the nearest station now in the town where I work my only public transport option is the bus.

I have no complaints about the bus, (the take it as you find it mindset being a neccessity). Most days I have a whole single decker and maybe one or two fellow passengers on days when a double decker runs. It's almost like having a private driver.

While I waited for the train I availed myself of the facilities and purchased a hot chocolate drink. While the chocolate was dark and had a modicum of froth, that soon dissipated, it did not compare favourably with that from St. Austell Railway Station. There the hot chocolate is made with a steamer within your sight and it has a magnificent luxuriousness about it - the froth remaining all the way to the bottom of the chocolaty goodness. (Crikey, I must be keen - a bit advertisey that but I am writing while the train whisks me to Redruth and do not have the time to amend the above prose.

As I sit here and glance about I can see the strangest thing. Beneath a seat opposite and slightly ahead of me is a small clear bowl on the floor under the seat; it contains a small amount of liquid, that rolls about the interior in time to the motion of rhe train. Who could have left such a thing? What might it have contained when full? Much more liquid than I would expect to be left over from a salad.

We are leaving St. Erth station now and heading for Hayle. Everytime I travel this area I think about getting a map to pick out the features that we pass. the Towans, the harbour so much in need of restoration, an indicator of how the fortunes of this once prosperous town have fallen, alongside the collapse of the Cornish mining industry; the church with it's cemetary standing proud above it and earlier, between St. Erth and Penzance, that little church peeping over a ridge, suggesting a route of what might be an interesting detour.