Mousehole & Newlyn

Mousehole and Newlyn sit barely a mile apart on the coast west of Penzance, and make an interesting pair precisely because they're so different in character.

Mousehole (pronounced "Mowzel") is the smaller and prettier of the two — a tight knot of granite cottages around a tiny harbour, well known locally for its Christmas lights, which have been strung across the harbour every December since the 1960s. The village was also the birthplace of Dolly Pentreath, traditionally remembered as one of the last native speakers of the Cornish language.

Newlyn, by contrast, is a genuine working port and one of the largest fishing harbours in England by value of catch landed. It gave its name to the Newlyn School of painters, who gathered here from the 1880s onward drawn by the coastal light, and the harbour is still busy with fishing boats rather than pleasure craft.

Getting between the two

Mousehole and Newlyn are connected by a level coastal path along the seafront, an easy 20-30 minute walk, with Penzance itself a similar distance further on from Newlyn.