Cornwall with my Dad (和父亲一起重游康沃尔)

I travelled to Cornwall with my Dad. Of course he wasn’t there physically, but his memories and pictures accompanied Zhaoyang and me as we trekked through the Cornwall countryside, backroads, tiny roads and towns with his picture book in hand looking to find the exact locations he and his sister were in 1949. There were some successes and some failures but the adventure was more than worth it.

今天我和父亲一起重游了沃尔康地区。当然他并没有真正的在那里，但是他的记忆和照片伴着我和赵杨同行。手里拿着当时他拍摄的照片，我俩走在沃尔康地区的各式各样的乡间小路上，海滩和岩石上，试着找出1949年他和他妹妹旅游时驻足的每个确切的地点。这些寻找有些成功了，有些失败了，但是这种探寻很值得。

I’m not exactly sure of many of the details of his trips because he never talked to me about it. But being there and seeing the places firsthand gave me a much better appreciation of how it must have been. I think he took the train to Cornwall and then used busses to get to the various cities. I’m sure he was there for many days as the distance between the cities, especially by bus would require it.

我其实对父亲当年的旅游不是很了解，尤其是很多细节都是一个谜，因为他从来没有和我说过他的那次旅行。但是亲自来到和看到他当年游历过的地方，让我有了对他的旅行的更多崇敬和感激。我觉得他当年是坐火车来到的沃尔康地区，然后坐巴士在各个小镇和村庄间穿梭游览的。我觉得他应该在各个地方停留了很多天的，因为距离以及当年交通设施的状况，很难做到像我现在这样开车，然后离开到下一个目的地的。

The first stop on our adventure is Land’s End. This is England’s most southern point and the views of the coast and the rocks is breathtaking.

我的寻找的第一站是天涯海角。这是英国最南端的一点，这里的景色真的是美的惊人。

The First & Last house in England was still there, mostly the same but without the roof writing.  There were many pictures from Land’s End in his collection. Some were easy to identify, like this one, but others were much more elusive. I had found the negatives to many of the pictures and they weren’t labeled and they were mixed up in different envelopes. One of them was of a rock. And it could have been any rock. It didn’t seem to be that special and it could have come from anywhere.

那个“第一个和最后一个”的房子当年就在，现在这个房子看起来没什么很大的变化，只是当年名字是写在了房顶上。父亲当年在这里拍了很多照片，照片上的地点有一些很容易就能找到，比如那个房子。有一些就很难找到，因为我找到的父亲拍的照片很多都是底片，那些底片并有任何说明或是标明地名之类的，而且从各个地方拍的都混到了一起。比如下面照片上的这块大岩石，这岩石可能是来自任何地方，任何海滩上的岩石。

Anyway, a few weeks before we left for our trip, through some various googling of terms that I can’t remember, I found this rock. It is called, Dr Syntax, apparently for the face in the rock that resembles a schoolmaster character from an c1812 comic book. If you see a sign in a British pub signs depicting a man with protruding chin, a wig, and black clothes, that will be the famous schoolmaster.

但是就在我们这次旅行的前几个星期，在我例行的google搜寻当中，我忽然找到了这块岩石。它叫 Dr Syntax，岩石看起来像一个人的侧脸，而这个侧脸看起来很像一个大约在1812年的漫画书上的人物，一个学校的校长。如果你看到一个英国酒馆的牌子上有一个男人的素描像，描绘一个突出的下巴，带着假发，穿着黑色的一幅，那么他就应该是这个有名的校长。

Due to a combination of rain, distance and not know the exact location we weren’t able to see the famous rock in person. But we had fun trying, as did several of the staff who brought out various maps and books trying to figure out where exactly it was.

因为时断时续的雨和较远的距离，和我并不知道Dr Syntax的石头的确切地址，我俩便没有亲自去看一下那块有名的石头。但是我们在尝试的过程中享受到了快乐，比如在这里的工作人员拿出各种地图和书籍，试着帮我们找出确切的地址。

We did find the next spot, which was quite easy. It’s one of the most famous rock formations in Land’s End called the Armed Knight. Anyway,  Dad was much better dressed on his visit than I was 🙂

我俩很容易地就找到了另外一个地点，看下面的照片中远处背景中的那些岩石，它们是在天涯海角非常有名的岩石群，叫做Armed Knight （武装的骑士）。看起来我父亲当年比我穿的更正式些。

Our most disappointing adventure in Land’s End was to a place called Nanjizal Beach or Song of the Sea Cave. This photo to me was the most interesting and I really wanted to experience that location in person. When I first saw the photo I had thought it was taken in Scotland. It wasn’t until many years later that I was able to identify the location a few miles east of Land’s End. We tried several ways to reach the location but it was unfortunately not in the cards for this trip. Sorry Dad, we tried.

在这次天涯海角探寻的旅途中，最让我失望的是没能去一个叫Nanjizal 的海滩，也叫Song of the Sea Cave （海洞之歌）。下面这个照片对我来说是最奇妙的一张，我真的很想亲自去那里看一下。当我第一次看到这张照片的时候，我以为是在苏格兰拍摄的。直到很多年后，我才找到了这个地点就在距离天涯海角几英里的地方。我俩试了几种方式，希望能去那个地方，可是失望的是我们都没能去成。对不起，爸爸。

We visited several other places including Mousehole and Lamorna Cove …  I’ll add another post about those later. Time for bed.

我俩还去了几个其它的地方，比如毛斯尔，拉莫纳科夫… 我会找个时间再写另一片博客。现在是睡觉时间了。