Liskeard

Liskeard is ideally located for touring Cornwall and Devon with most of both counties within an hours drive. Liskeard Town has been the centre of South East Cornwall for centuries with a long tradition as a market centre. Today there is still a busy cattle market in the centre of the town once a week. Click here for Liskeard Town web site

There are a variety of restaurants in Liskeard and the surrounding area. Click here for more details on restaurants There are a number of local cab and car hire firms click here for more details on cabs

While Liskeard retains many of its older buildings, pride of place is given to Stuart House (15th/16th Century) where King Charles I once stayed, and which is now a busy centre for arts and community activities. The town offers a variety of shops and restaurants and the Liskeard Heritage Trail finds places to explore. Click here for more on Stuart House

Liskeard, unusual among Cornish towns, has excellent dual-carriageway road links via the A38 Trunk Road from Plymouth, the M5 and the rest of the UK. The A30 which runs right through central Cornwall is close by. The town also benefits from express rail links direct from London Paddington, the Midlands and the North and will one day benefit from European expresses direct to Plymouth. A local branch line train runs from Liskeard to Looe Click here for more detail on the Looe Valley Railway

Looe is a small fishing port about 6 miles downstream from Liskeard. A canal originally connected the two towns but today there is the Looe Valley Line. When the canal was in operation in the distant past, copper, tin and other ore from Caradon Mine on Bodmin Moor was conveyed by gravity trucks down to barges on the canal. When the barges reached Looe, the ore was loaded on to ships. In the evening it is said, Contraband would find its way up the canal to Liskeard. After that it be conveyed to the Jamaica Inn on Bodmin Moor.

Flying time from Plymouth Airport to London Gatwick, or Newquay to Gatwick or Stanstead is less than one hour with single journey prices as low as £19.00 Both airports serve most UK airports but Newquay Airport serves many European destinations too. Plymouth airport is within 30 minutes and Newquay 40 minutes driving time from Pencubitt. Plymouth Airport Newquay Airport

The local area, South East Cornwall, is renowned for its beautiful scenery. The superb countryside and coastline of the area, along with its extensive coastal and natural heritage and wide range of recreational opportunities, provide the visitor with a landscape and community of unparalleled richness.

The local landscape is dominated by the granite mass of Bodmin Moor rising to over 1,000 feet above sea level to the north of Liskeard. On the South side of the moor look for Minions, where the mining heritage centre can be found and historical monuments over 5000 years old.. From the southern edge of Bodmin Moor the land drops steadily towards the English Channel, some 12 miles away.

From the moors, rivers flowing south have carved deep valleys which now support fine woods. Between these valleys are high, open and rolling agricultural landscapes, which stop abruptly at a spectacular coastline of cliffs, bays and sandy beaches. Many of the Valleys have been turned in to tropical gardens all along the South Coast. The coast is broken at intervals by tidal river estuaries with mud flats of considerable conservation importance.

The countryside is rich in items of nature conservation value and heritage interest, including rare flora and fauna and historical remains of great antiquity or more recent industry.

The local industry has mainly been fishing and mining. Fishing and mining in Cornwall and Devon has been taking place since the arrival of man. Once rich in Tin, Copper, Lead, Arsenic and other valuable minerals mining is now extinct. Fishing has also been drastically reduced over the past 20 years.

The area is a pleasant rolling landscape of arable and pasture lands, framed by the broad expanses of Bodmin Moor to the North, the Heritage Coast to the South, the beautiful Tamar Valley to the East and the amazing Fowey Valley to the west.

Fowey (pronounced Foy) is not only an historic town but also a commercial seaport. Over the centuries Fowey has grown and now stretches for about a mile along the west bank of the River Fowey to the mouth of the river. Situated on the opposite bank, also at the mouth of the river, is the village of Polruan. A regular passenger ferry connects the two and further up river a car ferry runs from Fowey to Bodinnick on the other side of the river.

These features provide the district with a rich diversity in both human heritage and environmental terms. It is an undeniably superb environment which is a key factor in the area's attractiveness to visitors.

Looe

Bodmin Moor

Tamar Valley

Fowey Valley