- Tintagel
- The legend of king Arthur being connected to Tintagel Castle really blossomed
after Alfred Lord Tennyson visited it in the 1840's and wrote Morte d'Arthur
and The Idylls of the King. Dickens, Thackery and Swinburne all added literary
weight to Arthurian Tintagel. It is unclear whether the great headland of
Tintagel was inhabited in Celtic times, but the castle and field system date
from medieval times. The present castle, in the care of English heritage,
was occupied by the Earls of Cornwall from the middle ages.
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- In the village are King Arthur's great halls, with 72 stained glass windows
depicting the deeds of the Knights of the Round Table. This complex was built
in the 1930's by Fredrick Glascock, a local custard millionaire.
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- Originally a small manor house, the Old Post Office in the village s now
owned by the National Trust
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- Extensive quarrying of the cliffs for slate took place in Victorian times,
and slate was winched straight off the cliff tops at Penhallick Point into
sailing vessels below.
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- Torpoint
- A car ferry links Devonport with Torpoint in Cornwall. It is a small working
town with strong links to shipbuilding, the naval dockyard across the water
and the sea.
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- Two miles north west of Torpoint is Antony House, owned by the National
trust. It is a queen Anne mansion owned by the Carew family since the 15th
century, though the present house was built in 1721. The house has wonderful
tapestries, a large dining room and library, and pieces of 18th century furniture.
The house is built of grey stone, and faces a forecourt enclosed by colonnades.
The east and west wings are built of red brick
Tregony
- A rotten borough which sent two MP's to Westminster until 1832. On the River
Fal, which used to be navigable up to Tregony, limestone and coal were imported
and hides exported. Eventually the river silted up and the port declined.
Of note in the village are a steep row of balconied almshouses built in 1696
and rebuilt in 1895
Trelissick
- National Trust gardens overlooking the River Fal. The house, a large 19th
century country house with a Grecian facade, is not open to the public. The
gardens consist of extensive parkland, woodlands and flowering shrubs best
seen in spring and early summer.
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- The King Harry chain drive ferry crosses the Fal near here, and it is believed
that a ferry has operated here for over a thousand years, though the harry
in question is Henry VI.
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- West of Carnon Downs is the thatched Quaker meeting house of Come-to-Good,
from the Cornish for "house in the wooded combe"
Tresillian
- Once the lowest bridging point on the Truro River, and the highest navigable
point from the sea. In 1646 the Royalist and parliamentarian forces signed
a cease-fire. The Wheel Inn was the headquarters of the Parliamentary army
- the inn has a spoked wheel of straw on its thatched roof. On the other bank
is the Tregothan estate, home of Lord Falmouth (not open to the public)
Truro
- A former stannary town, Truro today is the principal commercial centre for
Cornwall. Truro prospered as a port in the middle ages, but mine waste and
silt gradually clogged up the River Truro, and the town declined in the late
17th century. Then the expansion of copper and tin mining in the 19th century
lead to it becoming a business centre, and many Georgian buildings were constructed
at this time. All the westward turnpikes led to Truro, and in 1859 the railway
added new life to the town. It became a city in 1877, and was chosen as the
site for Cornwall's only cathedral in 1910. This was the first English Protestant
cathedral to be built since St Paul's. It has three spires and is built in
granite and Bath stone in early English and gothic styles. The existing 16th
century parish church has been incorporated into the cathedral's south wall.
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- Lemon Street is one of the best preserved Georgian streets in England. The
overall effect is to make Truro a very pleasant place to wander in today.
It is the main shopping centre for Cornwall
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