Country Diary: Cornwall

From Penzance a network of tracks and paths, with granite stiles built as cattle grids, allows unfrequented ways across the peninsula. Dark green crowns of trees mask streams flowing towards Mount's Bay; these strips of boggy woodland are edged with elderflower alongside small fields.

Foxgloves dominate the hedges: some of them are dappled with sunlight beside lanes that are shaded under sycamore; some are growing head high with seeding docks in unkempt bridleways; and the most luminous are mixed with red sorrel, blue sheep's bit and newly emerged polypody ferns on the banks of old droves leading towards Amalveor Downs. Around exposed fields, where wind stunts and prunes the hedge-top bushes, underlying granite boulders used in bank foundations and as crudely shaped gate posts indicate the effort of early clearance and enclosure of this stony land.

On the high commons, prickly mounds of sprouting gorse are splattered with cuckoo-spit and some clumps of heather are already flowering - a prelude to the later spectacular display of interwoven purple heather and yellow gorse.

From the lichen-tufted tor on top of Trendrine Hill (247m), the sea to the south appears hazy, but northwards, far below and beyond the expanse of tiny walled fields, it is cornflower blue. Down on the coastal belt paths lead through windswept pastures, thickets of thorn, blackberry flowers and honeysuckle to St Ives. North-facing Porthmeor beach, below the steep cemetery, is busy with swimmers, surfers, sunbathers and strollers enjoying midsummer's evening sun.