Summer is a-coming

The other day my wife and I were returning from our annual trip to London.  It was my wife's idea to go there; she's okay about living in Cornwall but does get a bit bored after having to endure a winter here.  Come March or April she gets cabin fever and says: "I need to see proper shops and proper people!" "Proper Job!" I reply, like a proper Cornishman, and off we go!! I needed to go up there as I have recently bought a couple of properties and wanted to give their details to my Estate Agent; I have to use a London Agent because I have found that when I advertise locally it attracts the wrong sort of person and people who are too tightfisted to offer a realistic price for the houses.

Anyhoo, we were driving back across Bodmin Moor and the traffic was getting busy on that bit where the road turns into a bridleway for a while.  We were crawling along behind one of those nuisance tractors (bloody pointless things...if you are going to live in a farmhouse drive a RangeRover like most farmhouse/barn dwellers do these days.) when the silliness of the situation struck me.  People here in Cornwall moan a lot about villages and coastal towns being empty and deserted in the winter months yet, when the weather improves and the holidaymakers and homeowners start coming back to claim what is rightfully theirs, the roads are so chockablock that it takes people an age to get to their destination.  They arrive all hot and bothered and with a poor impression of Cornwall; the risk then is that it might put them off from buying more property in the County, that would be bad for the economy and no one wants that to happen do they? So, we need to make these people feel welcome and their journeys here easier.

It would be wrong to build more roads or to widen the ones we have already got because that would use up valuable land on which houses could be built, so here is my suggestion; during the summer months and especially at Bank Holidays and in the High Season the Cornish should stop using the roads as much as possible and free up the space for holidaymakers.  I mean, it makes sense; their need is greater than the people who live here isn't it?  I know some people will say 'but my job is important and I need to drive' but let's be honest...if your job really was important then you wouldn't be doing it so far away from Civilisation would you?...I believe that if Cornish folk were a little less selfish about the roads then more holidaymakers would be attracted to the place and we'd all be happier.  So, in the interests of fairness I think that we should make this gesture towards our friends from up country.  If you can suggest any other gestures you would like to make to holidaymakers then let me know at charlton.musgrave@gmail.com .