The Coast of the Roseland Peninsula (from Turnaware Point to Mevagissey)

THE LOST GARDENS OF HELIGAN

The award winning Lost Gardens of Heligan are 400 acres of superb pleasure grounds, a magnificent complex of four walled gardens containing; exotic fruit houses growing pineapples (heated by the ancient system of straw and decomposing manure) and banana trees and peaches etc; a Victorian kitchen garden; an Italian garden; a crystal grotto and a jungle ravine, complete with waterfalls and many sub-tropical plant species. The whole complex, abandoned in the 1920's has been restored to its former glory as a living museum of 19c horticulture. Tim Smit the moving spirit behind the Lost Gardens restoration project has recently discovered and restored a system of lakes and streams overgrown for 70 years and now is going ahead with the £100 million Eden Project ( four different climate features in a vast covered dome structure) in a disused St Austell china clay pit as part of the Millennium celebrations.

16.GORRAN HAVEN

Sandy beach, partly sheltered by a stone pier; access through steep, narrow streets of the village. Trailer boats can be launched over the beach only when traffic is quiet. There are several safe, pleasant swimming spots on patches of sand reached from the coastal path leading to Mevagissey. Strong tidal swirls are frequent near Gwineas rocks. a mile offshore due east, and small boats should approach with care.

18. PORTMELLON

Sand-and-shingle cove. weedy at low tide. At high tide during storms the road. which closely follows the foreshore. is often awash and littered with boulders. Trailers can use the slip way only when traffic is light.

19.MEVAGISSEY.

Fishing village with streets so narrow and congested that even pack animals - in the days when hundreds of hogsheads of pilchards were caught every day - could not get through. Loads had to be carried on poles resting on the shoulders of two men walking one behind the other The principal market for pilchards was the Royal Navy. who called the fish 'Mevagissey Duck'. At that time, up to the end of the last century, the town was said to reek of fish. Today, the fishy tang in the air comes as much from fish and chip shops provided for visitors as from the handful of commercial fishing boats still using the harbour. In 1950 an attempt was mede to revive the pilchard industry by settling a group of Spanish fishermen, but It failed because few pilchards could be found. Today the town is one of the West Country's principal shark-fishing centres and the quays provide a lively scene as the boats come in at the end of the day. Boat trips, shark-fishing trips. sea-angling from piers, folk museum in 18th-century boat-builder's workshop, open daily Easter to September, aquarium. Parking.