I think if I tell someone casually that one weekend I visited Land’s End and the Lizard, I would get some weird looks. Who can tell what I’m talking about? Who can tell that I’m talking about two actually existing and pretty remarkable points of England?
England has lots of magical places which are absolutely worth visiting, but one of my favourites is definitely Cornwall, the region in the extreme south-west of the main island. It is the very last corner of the peninsula which stretches into the Celtic sea, towards the Atlantic ocean. Cornwall is a very popular county for holiday-makers, because of its long coastlines, breathtaking scenery, rugged landscape and relatively warm climate. It is a place where you feel out of this world, or at least out of the usual British world. You drive around 3-4 hours from Oxford, which is enough to get to this isolated, calm place with little coastal towns and narrow, winding streets.
There are so many things one can do here, from hiking, surfing to visiting castles, strolling around in small towns, or going to an open-air theatre, watching dolphins if lucky enough. But there are two absolute must-see points: the Land’s End and the Lizard. Why?
As you can assume from its name, the Land’s End is really the end of England. It is the most westerly point of the land. You walk out to the very end of the cliffs (leaving the entertainment centre behind), and just stand there looking at the infinite sea merging into the Atlantic ocean. You really feel like somewhere at the end of the world, where no men’s rules are valid any more, there is no noise of cars, no rush, even time almost stops. You’re standing on the very edge of the land, right in front of you it’s only the steep face of the cliff falling straight into the deep sea. Beneath your feet, the waves are rushing rhythmically against the solid granite rocks.
It’s like a battle: the deep blue water storms angrily and rumbling with the intention of destroying everything, but the high cliffs are standing proudly against the continuous raids like giant shields, that are ready to protect the land, ready to fight back, and break the water-mass into small drops, that are jumping up in every direction, stopping for a moment high up in the air to sparkle in the rays of the sun for a last time, and finally falling back harmlessly. You are in a place, where the wind whizzes tales in your ear about faraway lands over the vast waters. Finally, when you turn back, you realise that you’re not only at the end of the land, but now at the beginning of it, which serves as the starting point for a next adventure.
Once you’re in this area, you cannot miss the most southerly part of the mainland: the Lizard Point. It’s the tip point of the Lizard peninsula, not far from the Lizard village. Interestingly, it has nothing to do with the little reptile as one’s first association would suggest, but the name comes from the Cornish Lys Ardh, meaning ‘the high court’.
Lizard point was a starting point for many ships for the Atlantic, but the Lizard’s coast is particularly hazardous to shipping, and the seaways around the peninsula were historically known as the “Graveyard of Ships”. To help this, the Lizard Lighthouse was built at Lizard Point in 1752 to guide vessels passing through the English Channel, and the Royal National Lifeboat Institution operates The Lizard lifeboat station here, which already rescued lots of people from shipping disasters. I don’t have to say that, again, the view from here is amazing. You just cannot get bored with the vast waters, the waves, and long cliff walls with their red-brown-grey-green colours (at least in autumn).
So now if you hear the question “have you ever been to the Land’s End and/or the Lizard?”, you will at least know that you’re not necessarily the victim of a prank. You also know that if you ever visit England, and you’re a big fan of the sea and nature, rugged lands, beautiful coasts, lighthouses, deserted capes, and towering cliffs, then your place is Cornwall, where you can also visit the most westerly and southerly points of the English mainland: the Land’s End and the Lizard.