A quiet day in Padstow

 

I suspect the answer to the question, what did you do the first day of your week away is seldom - spend three hours in Tesco's car park. But that would be Drew's answer today! [Co-pilot's note: Never let it be said, dear readers, that I do not know how to party!!]

Having settled in to our lovely accommodation yesterday we were ready for a quieter day today. Though the Honda E is a joy to drive being on the road for six hours and 211 miles is not conducive to rushing around the next day. I got up at 4:15am and begun uploading photos and starting this new blog.

Last night I'd noticed that the Instavolt location in Padstow which has two chargers and is 0.9 of a mile from our accommodation appeared to be turned off. It seems that there has been a dispute between Instavolt and the site owners so the planned charging location is unavailable.  

⚠️ Update ⚠️ Please be aware that our Padstow site (PL28 8RW) will be offline from 30th September while the chargers are relocated to new spaces on the existing site. We will advise once this work is completed. We apologise for any inconvenience caused during this time.

— InstaVolt (@InstaVoltUK) September 29, 2021

Drew had noticed that Pod-point has chargers in Tesco's Car Park (Tesco's is 0.3 of a mile from here) but that these were of a 7kwH type not the rapid chargers (which are typically 50kw+). I'd not spotted this, as I'd set my Zap-map App to only look for chargers above 25kw whereas Drew hadn't done this in his.

The Pod-point called Mack-Jane became our friend. These 7kw chargers are the same style as those people with a drive or garage would have as home chargers. As we live in a terraced house with no drive or garage our home charging is done from a 13amp plug through the window of our front room (13amp charging is at 2.3kw per hour). The car came with two chargers a 13amp plug one and the one we are using to connect to Pod-point - we had never used this one before so I almost decided to leave it at home for this break - I'm glad I was persuaded otherwise. [Co-pilot's note: Someone, dear readers, accuses me of nagging - this is yet another, yes another, example of when I am right and someone else is wrong!!!] 

We went to Tesco's just before 8am, put the car on charge and then went and bought the few items - dishwashing liquid, milk etc - we needed and then returned to the car and sat and read until an hour and a half was almost past. Tesco have a 90 minute, no return within one hour rule in this Car Park. By this point we had charged to 56% and 63 miles all for free, or rather all at the kindness of Tesco who pay the electric charge.

We went back to the accommodation read some more had fruit for lunch and during the afternoon while I stayed at the accommodation and relaxed Drew decided to go back up to Tesco and sit in the car and read - as he said: "I can read just as comfortably there as I can here". So by early afternoon the car was 79% (90 miles charged) plenty for our first stage of the journey home next Friday, even though, knowing us, we will top up some more while it is free!

Mass

We continued to read and rest through the afternoon until it was time for me to go to Mass.

Padstow Catholic Community shares its worship space with the local Anglican Church. The community is served from Bodmin (one of five churches in the parish) and has Mass on Saturday Evening, so that the shared Church is available for Anglican worship on Sunday morning. 

I left the accommodation at 4.45pm and had arrived at the Church at 5:00pm ready for 5:30pm Mass. The Church, built in 1425, in the days when we were all Catholics is a traditional Norman Church dedicated to St. Petroc who built the first Church in Padstow in 518 (Padstow is a corruption of Petrocstowe - Petroc's Place - the Saxon equivalent to the Welsh place names associated with saints which here would be something like Llanpetroc or Llanbedrog). It  looked quite spectacular coming towards it from the dark path that leads down to the main door I'm impressed by the night mode of my phone camera which I'd not used before as to the eye the sky and church looked dark not bright as it suggests in the photo.

There is something really special about coming to the warm glow of a Church door open and welcoming.

I went to Confession before Mass (an half-hour surely isn't long enough, as Drew says, but it was!) and Mass began at 5.30pm. The Church was decorated ready for tomorrow's Remembrance Sunday celebrations with books already laid out.

The hymns at Mass were also around the remembrance theme. The first hymn being 'I Vow to Thee My Country', this is the first time I've ever sung this hymn, and the last one being Abide with Me. 

The readings, prayers and sermon were less focussed on those who died in war, but were focussed on the 'last things' with the priest's sermon reminding us that as the Church's year draws to its close, so we must move to thinking about the time when God calls us to himself, so that while praying for our dead loved ones during November, we also take stock of our own life, ready to meet the Lord when he calls us to himself. The priest explained that he had done a baptism and funeral this week and was reminded of the symbols - Holy Water, Easter Candle, White Garment (Pall) common to both. A reminder to meet the Lord as people living in response to the baptismal promises made for us when we were baptised. If I hadn't been to confession before Mass, I would certainly have been prompted to go soon by the sermon.

Mass finished at 6.15pm and the rest of the day, including dinner, will be described in the next post.