Happiest Days Mixed With Sadness

A Memory of Mousehole.

I fell in love with Mousehole back in 1970 when I came across it quite by accident. My girlfriend and I were staying at a B&B called LowLee which is positioned just outside Newlyn on the clifftop overlooking the sea. We would normally turn left out of LowLee and make for Sennen Cove which was our favourite beach. On this particular day we went right from LowLee and along the coast road which took us directly into Mousehole. We immediately fell in love with the place and for many years, throughout the 70's, stayed with an elderly couple who lived in the corner house as you turn left towards the harbour. The couple, Mr and Mrs Manly, were from Manchester originally and moved to Mousehole to retire. We would spend every holiday, bank holiday and even weekends, throughout the 70's, down in Mousehole and would leave work on a friday night in the east end of London and drive through the night to be in Mousehole as the sun came up. Mr and Mrs Manly were lovely people and would look forward to 'The London Boys' (as she called us) coming to stay.
We got an awful letter one day from Mrs Clark who lived opposite to tell us that Mrs Manly and her poodle, Rupert, had perished in a fire that totally engulfed their home. We were heart broken and we never felt the same about the place... we felt we had lost a dear family member. We were told that Mr Manly rebuilt the house and sold it but we don't know where he moved to. So very sad and a tragic end to years and years of halcyon days in the little piece of tranquility called Mousehole.

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