Thursday 31st May
Bude – Minack Theatre – Land’s End

I wake up feeling sixty two percent, sixty three and a half tops. I had been hoping for somewhere in the low seventies. Should I stay? Or should I go now? Fuck, I feel like I’ve totally lost my pilgrim momentum. My flywheel is sagging, listlessly, on its axel. Less than two weeks into The Great Adventure, and I’ve spent about as much time on a toilet seat as I have on a car seat.

My reflection in the bathroom mirror confirms my humbling: I look like a defeated, grey-haired old man. Who hasn’t even got the mojo to be crafty anymore. Meanwhile, down below, not all the hobgoblins and foul fiends in my bowels have heard the ceasefire call. And yet, and yet – I’ve got to get back on the road. I splash my face with cold water and give myself a pep talk in the mirror. I don’t know who’s talking to whom anymore. We both need one another if we’re gonna get back on the hitching donkey.

Sal and Ryan say I can stay as long as I need – and they mean it – but I’ve finally made up my mind. I summons my batman to fetch my well-worn donkey saddle, purchased in Skegness in 1976.

Over breakfast, Sal recommends I visit the Highwayman’s Inn on Dartmoor. “The landlord’s from Lincolnshire, too,” she chuckles.

I know Sal through her sister, Juliet, who I met when I lived in South Africa. We’re all from Lincolnshire. Sal and Juliet are from the Lincoln end of the Lincolnshire Cliffe, whereas my village was nearer Grantham. But we all remember frequenting the Joke Shop at the bottom of Lincoln’s Steep Hill, and searching for the Lincoln Imp in Lincoln’s grand cathedral. I hardly ever meet anyone from Lincolnshire, so when I do, it always adds a certain something to the friendship. A particular grimace, which carries with it a fond and mutual sense of commiseration. Weirdly enough, I met several people from Lincolnshire when I was in South Africa. It can turn you into an international traveller, Lincolnshire can.

Well, I’m definitely going to give Sal and Ryan top marks on hoboadvisor.

Before I came on this journey, I did a bit of research on the American Hobo Code. I’m guessing that British tramps had – maybe still have – their own version. In the American code, a picture of a cat means that a kind woman lives here. A simple cross means that religious talk will get you a free meal. A triangle with two stick arms means that a man with a gun lives here. Sleep in the hayloft; don’t go this way; watch out for the barking dog; the cops are active here; food for work; water not safe to drink; the owner is in; the owner is out – they had it all covered. They even had their own “hobo courts” where violations of the Hobo Code could be adjudicated by a group of your peers.

I pack my bags, go around the house making sure I haven’t left anything, and we all say our fond farewells. If laughter is the best medicine, then Sal for sure is the Surgeon General.

Walking out to the roundabout on the A39 I feel another one of those rusty middle-aged hitcher wobbles. Am I sure this shit still works? There’s not an ounce of momentum in me. Maybe I really am a bit old for this nonsense? Won’t people think I’m a bit weird? Or even pitiful? Don’t go there, Stephen. Self-doubt and hitching do not mix.

I reflect on the hard scientific evidence coming in from last week’s hitching: it obviously still works. And is working very well. Don’t fret, you skinny bunny. It’ll all come back to you.

There’s this zone before any poetry performance where I get nerves – and if I don’t get nerves, then I get a bit nervous. But it’s just an energy – and if I channel it correctly it becomes welcome fuel for the performance. So, I take my hitching nervousness – excitement by any other name – and welcome it into my system. Sure, if you’re standing at a roundabout in Bude on a Friday lunchtime, hitching a lift, you’re bound to get a few puzzled or even dismissive looks, but so what? And, anyway, you can project anything you want onto approaching drivers, especially because most modern windscreens tend to be tinted in such a way that you can no longer see people’s faces. Not like in the good old days when you could look into the whites of their Ford Cortina eyes.

Half an hour in, I begin formulating a sort of hitch-hiking prayer in my mind. Once I get the first line, the rest follows swiftly:

Nobody owes me a lift.
I wish everyone well.
I will get the right lift,
at the right time,
from the right person,
to the right place.

I like it. It’s even a bit Taoist – which ain’t surprising really, because if you travel any road long enough you begin to pick up its inherent qualities, and learn which attitudes get you where. The road may be a very dirty mirror, but it’s got no reason to tell you lies.

I repeat the prayer several times. It feels properly sturdy. And puts me in just the right vibe

Think about it. You’re driving along a road, and you see the silhouette of a man ahead of you... Is he..? Isn’t he..? Yeah, that man’s definitely holding out his thumb... When was the last time I saw a hitcher..? Do I want to pick him up..? Is it safe nowadays..? He’s got a rucksack... he looks harmless enough... Is there anywhere safe to pull over..? Is there anybody on my tail..? Yeah, I’ll give him a lift... All that – and maybe more – compressed into four seconds, three seconds, two seconds... It can’t be a well-considered, conscious choice to stop and pick someone up. It must be largely intuitive and reflexive, as much about the vibe as anything else – whether you consider vibes to be beatnik poetry or metaphysical reality. And as a hitcher, you’ve got to pump out – not even pump out, you’ve just got to... gently emit those good vibrations, in a sustainable, constant, imperceptibly rhythmic form. Or am I sounding like a lost and bourgeois hippie loon?

A guy who serviced dentistry equipment picks me up, on his way to St Agnes. Yeah, of course, someone has to service dentistry equipment. Welcome to yet another human world. He’s a sweetheart – gentle, friendly, and we chat about dentistry this and hitch-hiking that, whilst I watch the lush Cornish scenery roll on by.

Forewarned by Rotherham’s book, I keep my eyes peeled for village names. We pass through, and past signs to, so many villages named after saints – St Kew, St Mabyn, St Endellion, St Minver, St Breock, St Eva, St Mawgan, St Wenn – that it feels like we’re travelling through England’s long-lost holy land. And then there are the non-saintly village names, delightfully foreign to my eyes and ears: Trevemper, Rejerrah, Goonhavern, Zelah, Perranzabuloe, Marazanvose... They sound like the names of some of the Jumblies. Or the fair and rugged daughters of one of Neptune’s fair and rugged daughters.

And the land, oh, the Cornish land. It’s got its own vibration too. There must surely be dragons still lingering in these hills, living off layers of centuries-old dragon fat, occasionally waking to sniff the air and freshen their breath with hedgerow flowers, biding their dragon dream time until the scent of humanity grows sweeter. Or perhaps until it grows so sour that they feel they have to – not for the first time – intervene.

My dentist adds the Hurlers and the Cheesewring on Bodmin Moor, and the Dartmoor Inn at Merrivale, to my Map of Possibilities, and drops me by a small service station. There’s a Costa here, and as soon as my body knows of the proximity of a toilet it promptly informs me that my bowels definitely haven’t finished their protracted battle. But the Costa toilet is out of order. No worries – there’s a petrol station over the road. Out of bloody order, though. Yikes. My sphincter-control is sure being put to the test today. Fortunately, there’s a mini-supermarket too, so I go in there, and they have four loos. But one, two, three of them are also out of order, and the fourth is engaged. Half a minute feels like ten, and, oh, I could kiss the woman who comes out of there. I swear my body temporarily lifts off the toilet seat with sheer equal and opposite relief.

Still, I’m glad to be back on the road. Sixty seven per cent well and rising.

I add Land’s End to my A30 sign: A30 LAND’S END PLEASE. In all my years, I’ve never been to Land’s End. I really hope that it’s not as disappointing as John O’Groats, which I’ve only visited the once – on my 2008 hitch.

Ten minutes in, a quirky artist and tree grower from Penzance picks me up. Turns out she’s also an amateur investigator of Cornish stone circles, and is researching her own quirky hypothesis. “I’ve got several old maps,” she says, “of the old tin mines, and once I started comparing these to the positions of the stone circles and standing stones, I started to see a pattern – of the stones standing over important aspects of the mines.”

“Are you saying the mines pre-date the stones?” I ask.

“It’s possible. I haven’t proved anything yet. But all the mystical types aren’t happy with my findings – they sort of undermine, excuse the pun, their beliefs. Go to Boscawen-Un,” she says, “and tap your feet on the ground – it’s hollow.”

I ask a variety of questions to try and clarify her hypothesis, but she becomes a bit elusive. “There’s been a bit of a cover up,” she says. “People don’t want to know this.”

I love it that thousands of people have their own different takes and angles on these ancient sites and legends that lie scattered throughout these isles. And, personally, I never want any of these mysteries to be solved. May a thousand hypotheses bloom. And may any answers throw up more questions than they solve. Bloody mytho-poetic dawdlers! When will we ever face factual reality square in the face?

She drops me on a roundabout the other side of Penzance, and a car pulls over heading to Land’s End – “if you don’t mind a detour to the Minack Theatre first.”

I never quite figure out the relationship between the older driver and the young German passenger. I think she might be the daughter of a German friend of his, or a friend of one of his daughters – anyway, he’s being the gracious English host, driving her around Cornwall, showing her the sights. It feels like a very unlikely lift – but they’re really friendly, and I’m really glad we’re heading to the Minack Theatre, as a couple of friends recommended it when I put out my pre-pilgrimage call for sacred and profane possibilities.

Dug and blasted and carved out of an outcrop of coastal granite, it’s a fantastic amphitheatre, gazing south to sea, wide open to all five elements. Built by Rowena Cade and her gardener in the 1930s, and improved and adapted throughout her life, it’s a theatrical gem of a place. Definitely where you want to see The Tempest, which was the first play ever performed there.

Oh my, I love The Tempest. Studied it for A-level, and so glad I did. I saw a South African production in Stratford a couple of years ago – it put a whole African and colonial and racial twist on it all. Ariel was no light sprite, played with as much fire as air. Prospero had a imperialist tinge, and Caliban – wow, I’ve never felt so much sympathy for Caliban. He was definitely weighed down as much by Prospero’s cruelties and projections as he was by his genealogy. “This thing of darkness I acknowledge mine,” takes on gob-smacking power when uttered by a white man to a black man.

I’m pleased to see that the theatre has no canopy whatsoever, and both players and audience have to weather whatever the weather throws at them – actors have been known to wear bin bags below their costumes during rainy shows. Below the theatre, silhouetted against the dimpled sea, are seven simple crosses, and stage crew are busy getting ready for this evening’s performance: Jesus Christ Superstar. Unfortunately, the show is fully booked, but all three of us go round the exhibition, watch a short documentary, and have very English tea and scones in the café that overlooks Porthcurno’s sandy, busy, half-term-bustling beach.

In the exhibition there was a delightful photograph of Rowena Cade sitting on the hillside in an upturned wheelbarrow, lost in a book, her thick white hair illuminated by both sun and wind. Quite a dame.

Leaving the theatre, we ask around the evening arrivals for any return tickets, but no luck. It would have been such a cherry on the hitching cake. I remember seeing Jesus Christ Superstar as a child, during our annual family trip down to London. Mum and dad bought the record, and it bewitched me – more so because mum felt obliged to inform me and my brother that it was an interpretation of Jesus that she didn’t agree with. And seven-or-eight-year-old me could somehow understand why. Way too mortal. Even a bit sexy, which was a bit confusing. Mary Magdalene was definitely in love with Jesus. Maybe even Peter, too.

Land’s End is just down the road, and they drop me off in the tourist car park before heading off on their own evening walk. I swing by the Land’s End Hotel and order some food and a pint. A map on the wall of the bar shows the four extreme points of mainland Britain, according to latitudinal and longitudinal readings: Lizard Point, Cornwall; Lowestoft Ness, Suffolk; Ardnarmurchan Point, Argyll; and Dunnet Head, Caithness. I never knew. And I haven’t actually visited any of these places. Even more entries for the Map of Possibilities – sometimes the more you know, the more you realise how little you know. Maybe Britain will reveal itself to be a never-ending fractal of significant places to sniff and savour, and I’ll re-emerge sometime in the mid-twenty-third century, not even recognise the place, and have to begin all over again.

I sit at a table outside, awaiting my food, gazing westwards towards the Longships Lighthouse on Carn Bras. I’m glad that I didn’t get my hopes up about Land’s End, because it’s something rather special. Definitely does what it says on the tin. Both the sea and the well moody sky are vast reflections of one another, separated only by a bright horizon of peach-and-turquoise late evening light. If Lizard Point is the most southerly point of the mainland, then I’ve finally made it to the second cheek of Britain’s fair arse. Next stop west: Newfoundland.

Three quarters of the way through my meal and pint of well tasty Mena Dhu stout, the sea wind suddenly drops. Ten seconds later I notice that my ears are itching.

Well-seasoned alarm bells ring out: Midge alert! Midge alert! Midge alert!

There are many suggestions out there about how to deal with midges, from outright chemical warfare, through Avon Skin So Soft – allegedly favoured by the Royal Marines – all along the organochemical spectrum to marmite and citronella. But I’m a hardware man, myself. I spring into action like a well-trained hobo-squaddie: mozzie hat out and on and tucked inside my neckline; gloves on and tucked into unrolled sleeves; trousers tucked into socks. Reporting for duty, sarge. Neither a cool nor stylish approach, I’m sure, but does the job. And, more’s the point, this method has been tried and tested many times in the Royal Midge Realms of the Scottish Highlands and islands. Annoying though they are, in comparison to their Scottish counterparts, English midges really are wimpy, lily-livered sassenachs.

I finish my meal and pint rather awkwardly – lifting my mozzie veil for every mouthful or slurp – and then visit the pub toilets for evening water bottle filling, ablutions, et cetera. I’m pleased to report that my intestinal hobgoblins are calming down. They sure were beginning to daunt my spirit.

Then I join the coastal path and strike out north.

Hugging the coast has obvious advantages when it comes to finding somewhere to camp: in my experience, you’re rarely more than a mile away from a tip top, open-air B&B. And it isn’t long before I find one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever camped: somewhere between Land’s End and Sennen, off the path and below a rocky outcrop, serenaded by a patch of late bluebells above me and the symphonic sea below. Nobody’s going to find me here – or, if they do, they’ll be an interesting person to chew the cud with.

I put my tent up on the flattest piece of ground I can find, do some chi kung – “pushing the wave” sure reveals its energetic delight when facing the sea – and then settle myself down for the evening show.

I can still make out the lonely Longships lighthouse to the south, and on a cliff face to the north there’s the outline of a grumpy old man, properly peeved he is. And below me, sitting on its own rocky nest, surrounded by a swirl of sea and foam, is the most magnificent cubist stone eagle, perched like a royal sentry, ever ready, ever alert. He or she is definitely going to be my guardian for the night.

And then, all of a sudden, the sun drops out of the low clouds, down into No Man’s Land, and unfurls an inviting avenue of fiery light across the sea’s surface, from the distant horizon all the way to the dashing rocks below. If I were a demi-god, I’d be sorely tempted to accept its brilliant invitation, and leave this messy, mortal, anal plane.

I open up my Soul Food companion, and am greeted by this solidly simple verse:

My real dwelling
Has no pillars
And no roof either
So rain cannot soak it
And wind cannot blow it down!

Ikkyu

(translated by John Stevens)

It’s late. I haven’t got a clue what the hickory dickory dock time is, but it’s definitely way past my bedtime. I climb into my tent and say goodbye to the merry month of May. Until we meet again, my beautifully fecund friend, until we meet again...

---

rock


rock has met this other rock
they are entering one another
as slowly as only rocks know how
with exquisite geological pressure

this takes a million years

then they roll over
and grin
as rocks only know how
grinning like granite
eyes a-twinkle like pins and needles and stars

rock lets out
a breath of tired and quiet satisfaction

and in the passing of this rocky sigh
I am born
I live
I die