We’ve been in Cornwall for a flying visit to sort out some business today. Just down this morning and back tomorrow.

On the way down we had a really good lunch in a pub in Plymouth with Simon Kirk, what a lovely chap he is. As usual with meetings of PBASE people, there were so many bags of camera equipment on the table, more than the assorted food and drinks! Simon was on a day off from work and gladly met with us when we suggested having lunch together. Thanks for a good lunch Simon.

After a couple of meetings, we made our way to a pub from the ‘good pub guide’ my bible of places to eat, drink and sleep! This time the Old Ferry Inn in Bodinnick. It’s next to a chain ferry that takes cars and foot passengers across the River Fowey. The river valley has this strange sound of the scraping of the iron ramps onto the concrete slipway then the sound of the chain pulling the ferry across the water all day from dawn till dusk. It’s an eerie sound but the ferry is a good, fast way of making the crossing.

The inn is just around the corner from the ferry slipway and is a really good example of a traditional English pub with rooms. We chose it because of their willingness to take us and the dogs with relatively short notice really but were not disappointed at all by the hospitality we received there.

It’s a strange fact of business travel that you can end up losing the ability to enjoy staying in ‘ordinary’ places. I find myself needing to check irritation that there isn’t a proper shower and no bath liquids etc, but that feeling soon goes away when you remember the total lack of charm of business hotels around the world and this place oozes it. The setting is fabulous and the pub itself, a delight.

Our friends Alan and Dee come and meet us in the bar for supper and we spend a happy evening making plans for the future and discussing the practicalities of our plans over dinner. The dogs were under the table snoozing (before Archie accidentally ran headlong off the end of the slipway and into the sea on their late night walk).

At one point, David was in animated conversation with Dee about some aspect of our project and they were leaning towards one another, eyes shining and gesticulating, while bathed in the light of a candle on the table and I looked across and thought to myself ‘this is it. I can’t imagine any way that I could be happier.’