Anne Boleyn and the German Hand Cream July 24th 2013

We sleep, decide to walk to the Minack Theatre. We are assured it is only about 15 minutes across the cliffs. There was a clue I probably should have heeded in that description:
 Cliffs.
'Could we bike over?' I ask the OAP taking our money.
'Well, I suppose you could, yes. Might be a little steep in places.'
She obviously hasn't walked that route since The Ark Ages. She might have given Noah good advice on boat building, but there is something about her 1950's perm that makes us opt for Shanks's pony. A Shetland would have been better, but in the absence of that my pannier is loaded up instead: picnic, two sticks, a brolly and waterproofs. BB has his camera. It weighs a lot. Rain is forecast for exactly when the performance of  Anne Boleyn starts.
Never mind, we're British.

Over the numerous stone styles made from giant boulders, topped with signalling arms Dr Beeching donated in the 60's. We lift and lower - just the job for electric bikes weighing as much as a pair of pensioners. A twisty-turny path with little coloured arrows lies ahead, no signs to indicate that we might (or might not) be going in the right direction. They point us both ways along the cliff, and in the absence of either a map or compass, we head down to what should be the beach. Still no signs, but there are some foreign people to ask,
'Is this the way to the theatre, please?
'Yes, it is, but I'm afraid you're too late!' The accent is guttural.
'Oh no!'
'Yes! It is now shut!' They smile, pleased to be so helpful.
Our faces fall, we wonder if a tornado is forecast. The theatre only cancels in the event of an act of war, God, or both.
'They haff shut it for the performance this afternoon! We tried to buy tickets! There were none left!'
You will notice there are a lot of exclamation marks in this exchange. What you might miss is the slight intimation that we have only got what we deserved for being late risers. Obviously only the early bird catches worms in their country. But we are in ours.

The view from BB's Rabbit Run

 'Good job we've got some tickets then,' says BB waving the distinctive Minack envelope. Seems we are better organised than they are after all - a bit of a cultural shock to all parties. They nod their heads with a new-found respect. We smile, and feeling ever-so slightly smug move along the increasingly busy path towards the sea, giant cliff looming. There is a faint scent of hubris in the air, but we are too near to our goal to heed it.
Still no signs for the theatre. BB thinks it might be up a random hill path, a 1 in 3 rabbit run.



He nips up, I stand with sticks, cluttering the narrow path but unable to take a single leap up this vertical bank. Attempting it will tip me backwards into the forest of Gunneras behind, and there is already a dead elephant ear on the path showing what a foible that would be.

I note that a toddler perished at this spot too, its dummy adorns a thistle. Very poignant. I need to proceed with caution.


BB appears at length, miles above me, and we agree I will follow the more orthodox route along the lower path. Relieved that I am not required to be a rabbit, I round the corner to discover four legs, a bleat and a pair of horns might help more than two legs and a pair of sticks. My squawk is more hen than goat.
Think 200 foot cliff, gibbon country, steps for giants, no handrails and the need for spring-loaded knees. I look at this amazing staircase rising up above my head, can't even see where it ends. The words, rock, hard place, and idiot spring to mind. The walk back to the car park and road is now too far behind me, there is nothing for it - up I go. At the first step I abandon my sticks and revert to being a toddler. Should've nicked that dummy when I had the chance. Hands still work, knees could do better. Young people skip past me, chattering, happy, some stop to ask if I am all right. Of course I am. I wave them on, resting on a step the height of a kitchen stool. This one I can't even rock myself up; I have to ask the Chinese girl behind me if she could give me a push.
'Every little helps!' I say merrily, slapping my bottom. She is flustered, turns out she doesn't understand a word of English, least of all a puffing old toddler enacting TV adverts. Suddenly I get a good old heave from behind, her mother has taken over bum duty. I thank them, recognizing there is only so much of this one can expect, or want, from a visitor to our shores. Pausing to catch my breath  I wonder what has happened to BB. I peer up, and peer down. I am equally stranded twixt top and bottom, unless a handy helicopter flies by. (Oh me, oh my!) I know it will, should I fall the hundred feet to the beach below, but then I'd miss the play. Perhaps I had the look of a jumper, because with more and more people streaming past, two young men ask if they can carry something. I want to reply, 'Yes, me!' but hand over my rucksack and the sticks with relief. Now I won't get tipped backwards by the weight on my back which is marginally heavier than the weight on my front. Must remember that for future mountaineering- a lighter pony pack. The lads kindly see me to the top as BB saunters down the path wondering where I had got to.
'Just be grateful you weren't there to see me crawl up this cliff,' I say. And looking at my red face, he is very grateful indeed.
 Sorry no pics of this episode. For some reason I forgot to ask those nice Chinese ladies if they could snap my arse before heaving it.

Having climbed 90 steps up, there is now a steep descent down to our seats in the stone amphitheatre, but a handrail is a wonderful thing. I mutter a prayer of thanks to their  patron saint. We are seated only a few rows from the stage, on hired cushions with backrests - £1 each, great value. The tickets were only £9, so apart from the marathon getting here, this is proving to be a great day out. The sea is churning not waving, the sky lowering not raining.  And we can eat our picnic overlooking the stage whilst waiting for the performance to begin. It is a spectacular venue, well worth getting scraped knees and soaked for.
The row in front of us is empty, but fifteen minutes before the show starts a coach load of young German students piles in to block our view. We are now sitting behind three tall jokers. A beautiful black boy, Chriss, who looks like he might advertise aftershave, or Calvin Klein knickers; a fair-haired crew-cut lad; and a standard spotty one. Chriss gets out his phone, puts it on video to film himself, checks and adjusts his already perfect hair. We watch this act of super-vanity with disbelieving delight. The wind is quite brisk, it undoes his manoeuvre with a nonchalant toss of the quiff, but fortunately Chriss is distracted by a strange demand.
'Chriss! Hand cream!' comes the shout, in English. We soon learn this is not because they speak perfect English, there is apparently no German word for this essential item.. 'Hand Cream!' the shout echoes amongst the boys in the group.
Are your mates taking the piss, Chriss? Apparently not: Chriss obligingly opens his little manicure bag, out comes a tube of hand cream and it is dispatched along the row of boys. Please note, this tube is not suncream, which might be sensible given that we are facing due south and should the sun come out we will all bake into a rows of crispy fried noodles faster than you can say Peking Duck.
Four times the cry goes up for hand cream. Chriss supplies four different varieties. What a star. These German lads must have the softest hands that do dishes in the whole theatre - while the rest of us have torn nails and grubby fingers from scaling those damned cliffs. I consider asking for a squirt myself, but Chriss and his admiring lads don't really do English, they giggle through the first half of the play, not at the words or actions, at their own  extraordinary wit. I keep thinking I will ask them to pipe down soon, but they are now effectively part of the show. Wouldn't want to miss any of it. We suspect they are here for reasons other than Thespian, and sure enough they don't reappear after the interval. Possibly the wind chapped their hands. The German girls, looking windswept and ordinary follow the whole play, laugh and clap in all the right places, no doubt with under-nourished hands, and are models of stoicism. What, we ask ourselves has happened to the German Male?

Dancing Queens

The play itself is very well acted by a theatre group from Stamford in Lincolnshire, and inspires us to actually read Wolf Hall on our iPads instead of keeping it for a rainy day.

One short shower of rain threatens our fun, but like good little campers we do not erect our brollies, oh no, but huddle under £1 macs from Poundsaver and a £1 tarpaulin. There is something oddly bracing about watching a play in the rain. If the actors can do it, so can we. Makes you proud.

Now it's time to ascend those very steep steps up the theatre and walk back to the campsite. Clouds are banking up, the sun a thing of distant memory. We take the main road down to the beach as the heavens open. By the time we reach the cliff tops on the far side, via numerous wrong turnings since those pesky piskies have stolen all the signs, we are leaking wet. But we don't care. We have waterproof skin under our macs, and the performance wasn't cancelled. We suspect the evening one will be declared null and void, an act of not just one God, but the whole damned raft of them.. It lashed down on the Duchess all night, but by this time we were in a paid-for electric hook-up site feeling we deserved that bottle of red and a fry up.