Port Isaac

The Museum of Witchcraft and Magic, Boscastle: A Darkly Fascinating Journey into Folklore and Belief Set in the atmospheric harbour village of Boscastle on Cornwall’s rugged north coast, The Museum of Witchcraft and Magic is one of the most unusual and quietly compelling museums in the UK. It is not a place of spectacle or entertainment in the modern sense, but a carefully curated exploration of folk belief, ritual practice, and the human fascination with magic across time and culture. Tucked beside the River Valency, just steps from the sea, the museum feels perfectly placed—remote enough to feel mysterious, yet grounded in a landscape long associated with stories, storms, and superstition. Arriving in Boscastle: a village shaped by landscape The journey into Boscastle already sets the tone. The village sits in a steep-sided valley where the river meets the Atlantic, creating a natural harbour surrounded by cliffs and winding lanes. Visitors typically arrive via narrow coastal roads, ...

Boscastle, Cornwall: Where the Land Narrows and Stories Deepen Tucked deep within a steep, winding valley on the rugged north coast of Cornwall lies Boscastle—a village that feels less like a destination and more like a secret discovered.  With its dramatic cliffs, ancient harbour, and layers of myth and memory, Boscastle is one of those rare places where landscape and history are inseparable, each shaping the other over centuries. There are places that feel designed for postcards, and then there are places like Boscastle—where beauty is almost accidental, shaped not by intention but by centuries of wind, water, and persistence.  Boscastle doesn’t reveal itself all at once. You descend into it gradually, as if stepping into a story that’s already been unfolding for hundreds of years. A Village Held Between Cliffs Boscastle exists in a kind of natural corridor. High, rugged cliffs press in on either side, while a narrow inlet pulls the Atlantic Ocean inland like a slow breath. ...

Bottreaux Castle, Cornwall: The Lost Stronghold Above Boscastle High above the winding valley of Boscastle, where the land tightens into green slopes and stone hedgerows, there is a place that no longer looks like a castle at all—yet still feels like one.  It doesn’t present itself with towers or walls. Instead, it survives as a shape in the landscape, a subtle rise in the ground where history has been softened by grass, wind, and nearly a thousand years of forgetting. This is the site of Bottreaux Castle—once a Norman stronghold, now a quiet earthwork that asks visitors to imagine what is no longer visible. A Castle That Became the Land It Sat On Unlike grand stone castles that dominate skylines, Bottreaux Castle was never destined to last in obvious form. Built shortly after the Norman Conquest, it likely began as a motte-and-bailey structure: a timber fortification perched on a man-made mound, accompanied by an enclosed courtyard below. Its purpose was strategic rather than cere...