National Trust Properties
Old Post Office
4 miles from 5 Valency Row
Pricing: Adult £5.00; Child £2.50
Website: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/tintagel-old-post-office
Do not, like me, be put off from going inside this property. For years, I walked out outside in beautiful weather eager to make the trek to Tintagel Castle, or to the dramatic cliff-top views from St Materiana’s Church; why would I pay money to look inside a tiny, dark, old post office?
It is fascinating. The property started off as a single storey house of three rooms with a through passage. Livestock would have been kept in the northern partition, an open hearth would have provided warmth and, without a chimney, smoke that seeped through the thatched roof and killed off woodworm and preserved the wooden frames. That was around 1380, the time of Richard II, the Peasant’s Revolt, and the Black Prince had not long undertaken renovation work at Tintagel Castle.
Over the years the thatch roof was replaced by slate, a chimney was built and various extensions were annexed on. Finally the property became a letter-receiving office for the village in Victorian times, hence its current dull name. And at that time the building fell into such disrepair it was planned to be demolished before a local campaign made the renovations and and the National Trust took it over in 1903. Which means the inside of the house is preserved like few others.
Lanhydrock
21 Miles from 5 Valency Row.
Pricing: Adult £17.00; Child £8.50
Website: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/lanhydrock
Lanhydrock is a large late country house and estate. Although its roots are Jacobean, it was completely refurbished with late-Victorian style and mod-cons after a devastating fire in 1881. This style remains and the property shows a very rich household’s way of life contrasting the elegant luxuriant family areas with life downstairs in the kitchens and servant’s areas.
Cotehele
33 miles from 5 Valency Row
Prices: Adult £13.00; Child £6.50; Car park £3.00
Website: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/cotehele
The Cotehele estate has a Tudor house decorated as you might expect from a Tudor style with tapestries, pewter, dark oak, and arms and armour making it very atmospheric. But the estate is really what’s worth visiting. There are various formal terraced gardens, a valley garden with a medieval stew pond, orchards and woodland leading down into the Tamar Valley where there is a picturesque quay and a working watermill.
Trerice
33 Miles from 5 Valency Row.
Prices: Adult £11.00; Child £5.50
Webpage: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/trerice
An Elizabethan Cornish Manor House with an original 16th Century glass great hall window and lots of interesting pieces in its collection including wooden skittles and a 300 year-old longcase clock. The property looks like it should be straight out of the Poldark novels and it is said to have been Winston Graham’s inspiration for the Poldark mansion (although the latest television was shot at a property in Gloucestershire).
Buckland Abbey
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37 miles from 5 Valency Row
Prices: Adult £13.00; Child £6.50
Website: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/buckland-abbey
Originally built as a Cistercian Abbey in around 1278, it remained so until the dissolution of the monasteries by King Henry VIII who sold it in 1541 to his Sewer of the Chamber, Sir Richard Grenville the elder (no giggling – it was basically an administrative office performing menial tasks at the direction of gentlemen ushers). Sir Richard the elder, and then his son, Sir Roger Greynvile, worked on converting Buckland Abbey into a house. Sir Roger Greynvile was the captain of Henry VIII’s great flagship The Mary Rose and went down with her when she listed to one side and then sank off Portsmouth when engaging the French. Buckland Abbey was left to Sir Roger’s then 3 year-old son Richard Grenville, the younger (who became the man responsible for repairing Boscastle Harbour). Sir Richard, the younger despised Sir Francis Drake (famous for completing a game of bowls on Plymouth Hoe before sailing off to defeat the Spanish Armada) so, when Drake bought Buckland Abbey from Grenville, it had to be incognito through two intermediaries.
Buckland Abbey remained in the ownership of Drakes descendants until 1937 and was taken over by the National Trust in 1947. It is now part house, part museum and stuffed fill of treasures including Drake’s Drum which, legend has it, mysteriously beats by itself in times of peril.
Antony House
45 miles from 5 Valency Row.
Prices: Adult £11.00; Child £5.50
Webpage: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/antony
A beautiful early-eighteenth century mansion and still the home to the Carew Pole family whose family history can be traced back to Domesday and then to a nearby 15th century manor before building the present property in the early 1700s. Inside is an astonishing collection of period furniture, textiles and tapestries and portraits including by Sir Joshua Reynolds and a famous portrait of King Charles I at his trial. Outside are magnificent landscaped grounds that includes the National Collection of over 600 types of Daylilies.
Saltram
45 miles from 5 Valency Row.
Prices: Adult: £8.00; Child £4.00.
Website: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/saltram
Saltram is one of Britain’s best preserved early Georgian houses. It was designed by Robert Adams and the drawing room is considered to be one of his finest interiors. The house is magnificently decorated with lots of original contents including Chinese wallpapers, a library and lots of paintings many by Sir Joshua Reynolds.
The garden is mostly 19th century with an orangery, follies and beautiful shrubberies. The parkland rolls down to the river and provides a popular patch of greenery so close to Plymouth town.
Trelissick
45 miles from 5 Valency Row.
Prices: £13.00 Adult; £6.50 Child; Parking £5.00
Website: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/trelissick
The house has a rolling programme of exhibitions to tell stories from its diverse history but is secondary to the stunning gardens.
Trelissick is on its own peninsular overlooking the River Fal and has wonderful panoramic views across the estuary and down to the King Harry ferry. The gardens have lots of rare shrubs that take advantage of the mild climate, beautiful herbaceous borders and an orchard with about 70 different varieties of apple, most of which are Cornish.
St Michael’s Mount
62 miles from 5 Valency Row.
Prices: Adult £14.00; Child £7.00 plus ferry charges.
Website: https://www.stmichaelsmount.co.uk
Getting there: There is plenty of car parking along the sea front at Marazion. Crossing to the island (and returning again) depends on the tide and time of year and in bad weather the island will be closed. At low tide you can walk across on the causeway. At high tide in the winter you cross by the St Michael amphicraft which drives up and down the slipway at Marazion car park. In the Summer months a flotilla of small ferries make the crossing from the Chapel Rock a little way down the causeway at mid-tide of from two landing points in Marazion at high tide. The cost is £2.50 for an adult and £1.50 for a child, one way and must be booked in advance.
St Michael’s Mount is a Cornish icon. It was once a priory, became a fort and then a home to the St Aubyn family who have owned it since 1659 when it was bought by Colonel John St Aubyn, a parliamentarian, who had been appointed Captain of St Michael’s Mount during the English Civil war in 1647.
On the island you can see around the castle, explore the steep stone terraced gardens and look around the small village where around 30 villagers live but was once home to ten times more.