Fowey
~

If we were to pick our favourite place on the coast of South East Cornwall, it would perhaps have to be Polruan and Fowey, and the beautiful Fowey harbour and estuary, where we love to sail. The area around Fowey, Bodinnick and Tywardreath is very much "Daphne du Maurier" country, and for nothing better, view the harbour from the top of Polruan, or from the Old Ferry Inn at Bodinnick, opposite Daphne du Maurier's old house "Ferryside". For views of Ferryside, see the Bodinnick page.

Fowey takes its name from the river that it lies at the mouth of - the River Fowey, or in Cornish, the river of "Fow-wydh" or beech trees. Fowey should be pronounced FOY (as in boy), and most definitely not, as some may think, as FOU-Wee (as in now!). Say it like that, and you won't get served the best pasty!

Kenneth Grahame spent much time in Fowey, indeed was married here, and his wonderful story "The Wind in The Willows" was inspired by Fowey, and the riversides up to Lerryn inspired the Wild Wood. He liked nothing more than just "messing about in boats", just as Ratty did, and then of course there is Sea-Rat's famous description...

"...the little grey sea town I know so well, that clings along one steep side of the harbour. There through dark doorways you look down flights of stone steps, overhung by great pink tufts of valerian and ending in a patch of sparkling blue water. The little boats that lie tethered to the rings and stanchions of the old sea wall are as gaily painted as those I clambered in and out of in my own childhood; the salmon leap on the flood-tide, schools of mackerel flash and play past quaysides and foreshores, and by the windows the great vessels glide, night and day, up to their moorings or forth to the open sea."

Visit the Fowey Harbour page for more photographs around the harbour,
or the Fowey Shipping page for the China Clay and other shipping in and around the harbour.