Trebetherick
Encyclopedia
Village
A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...
on the north coast of Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. It is situated on the east side of the River Camel
River Camel
The River Camel is a river in Cornwall, UK. It rises on the edge of Bodmin Moor and together with its tributaries drains a considerable part of North Cornwall. The river issues into the Celtic Sea area of the Atlantic Ocean between Stepper Point and Pentire Point having covered a distance of...
estuary approximately six miles (10 km) north of Wadebridge
Wadebridge
Wadebridge is a civil parish and town in north Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The town straddles the River Camel five miles upstream from Padstow....
and half-a-mile (800 metres) south of Polzeath
Polzeath
Polzeath is a small seaside resort in the civil parish of St Minver in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately six miles north of Wadebridge on the Atlantic coast....
.
Trebetherick straddles the Polzeath to Wadebridge road and extends west to Daymer Bay
Daymer Bay
Daymer Bay is a bay and a beach on the east side of the River Camel estuary in north Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately six miles north of Wadebridge.Daymer Bay lies west of Trebetherick village at...
and northwest to Trebetherick Point, a rocky headland in the estuary, where the remains of shipwreck
Shipwreck
A shipwreck is what remains of a ship that has wrecked, either sunk or beached. Whatever the cause, a sunken ship or a wrecked ship is a physical example of the event: this explains why the two concepts are often overlapping in English....
s can be seen on the foreshore. The National Trust
National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty
The National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, usually known as the National Trust, is a conservation organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland...
owns land adjacent to Trebetherick Point.
Geography
South of Trebetherick Point is Daymer BayDaymer Bay
Daymer Bay is a bay and a beach on the east side of the River Camel estuary in north Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately six miles north of Wadebridge.Daymer Bay lies west of Trebetherick village at...
with a sandy beach sheltered from the Atlantic. The beach provides safe bathing for holidaying families and is also popular with windsurfers
Windsurfing
Windsurfing or sailboarding is a surface water sport that combines elements of surfing and sailing. It consists of a board usually two to four metres long, powered by the orthogonal effect of the wind on a sail. The rig is connected to the board by a free-rotating universal joint and comprises a...
.
At the south end of Daymer Bay Brea Hill
Brea Hill, Trebetherick
Brea Hill is a circular hill beside the River Camel estuary in north Cornwall, United Kingdom. The hill is high and there are Bronze Age tumuli at the summit...
rises to 62 metres (203 feet) with several tumuli at the summit.
Behind Daymer Bay's sand dunes and south of Trebetherick is the St Enodoc Golf Club's golf course
Golf course
A golf course comprises a series of holes, each consisting of a teeing ground, fairway, rough and other hazards, and a green with a flagstick and cup, all designed for the game of golf. A standard round of golf consists of playing 18 holes, thus most golf courses have this number of holes...
. Between its fairways is St Enodoc Church, a small church with a bent steeple
Steeple (architecture)
A steeple, in architecture, is a tall tower on a building, often topped by a spire. Steeples are very common on Christian churches and cathedrals and the use of the term generally connotes a religious structure...
. It lies considerably below the current surrounding ground level, having been excavated in 1863 after being completely buried by drifting sand.
Trebetherick Point, a headland to the west of the village, is designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest
Site of Special Scientific Interest
A Site of Special Scientific Interest is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom. SSSIs are the basic building block of site-based nature conservation legislation and most other legal nature/geological conservation designations in Great Britain are based upon...
for its geology
Geology
Geology is the science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which it evolves. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth, as it provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and past climates...
. The headland contain deposits from the Quaternary period
Quaternary
The Quaternary Period is the most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the ICS. It follows the Neogene Period, spanning 2.588 ± 0.005 million years ago to the present...
as well as various slate
Slate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. The result is a foliated rock in which the foliation may not correspond to the original sedimentary layering...
s.
John Betjeman
As a child, John BetjemanJohn Betjeman
Sir John Betjeman, CBE was an English poet, writer and broadcaster who described himself in Who's Who as a "poet and hack".He was a founding member of the Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architecture...
(who would later become Poet Laureate
Poet Laureate
A poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...
) enjoyed family holidays in Trebetherick and he returned there often as an adult. The surrounding area and its churches, railways and landscape (indeed, Cornwall in general) are celebrated in his work.
Betjeman's poem Greenaway describes the stretch of coast at Trebetherick between Daymer Bay and Polzeath
Polzeath
Polzeath is a small seaside resort in the civil parish of St Minver in Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is situated approximately six miles north of Wadebridge on the Atlantic coast....
where he often walked. It begins:
- I know so well this turfy mile,
- These clumps of sea-pink withered brown,
- The breezy cliff, the awkward stile,
- The sandy path that takes me down.
Another poem, Trebetherick, celebrates the area and also reveals Betjeman's familiarity with, and affection for, this part of the Cornish coast:
- We used to picnic where the thrift
- Grew deep and tufted to the edge;
- We saw the yellow foam flakes drift
- In trembling sponges on the ledge
Later in life, Betjeman bought a house called 'Treen' in Daymer Lane, Trebetherick, where he died on 19 May 1984, aged 77. He is buried half-a-mile away in at St Enodoc Church, a place he commemorated in his poem Sunday Afternoon Service thus:
- So grows the tinny tenor faint or loud
- All all things draw toward St Enodoc
John Betjeman's grave is on the right immediately inside the entrance gate to St Enodoc's churchyard.