Stylishly soggy – Honorary Cornish

Down down down to our seats

Another day of two blog posts - this time I'm not letting Paul check his emails before posting - he took over the computer for well over and hour and we don't have internet all the time here.

Besides, the Minack Theatre deserves a post all of its own.

The Minack Theatre is an open air theatre cut into the cliff and jutting out into the sea – spectacular! It looks like it was built much longer ago than it was, with terraces of granite and some grassed ones. It was finished in 1972 but performances have been held there since the 1920s. We had heard about this place from a number of sources and booked tickets before we left home for a performance during our stay – lucky as the whole week’s shows were fully booked. They hire out (for just one pound) clever seats with a self-supporting back rest. Everyone takes picnics and wine to enjoy while waiting for the show to begin.

The show we saw was The Sound of Music put on by a local youth theatre group and supported by a youth orchestra.

As the show started, the word went around the audience that a fisherman had said it would rain at 9pm. It was a beautiful night – cool but clear – so this was hard to believe.

Sure enough, a few drops of rain at about 8.45pm then down it came – almost exactly at 9pm. Our years of living in Melbourne and going to AFL games had led us to go prepared – on with hats and ponchos and we sat there in it just like the rest of the mostly local audience, although many had ‘fisherman clothes’ and full waterproofs.

Right down the front

At the end of the brilliant performance, the locals around us said we were ‘stylishly soggy’ and declared us honorary Cornish.

It was a real example of how ‘the show must go on’ with the children continuing on like nothing had changed. Maria was played by a 15 year old friend of our host’s daughter and the youngest was Gretl, played by an extremely enthusiastic 8 year old. The oldest actor was Captain von Trapp at 22 years old.

Full house

Sound of Music

Stylishly soggy!?

The End