Cornwall Geowalks are go!

After months of planning and building Cornwall Geowalks, I am stoked to finally get them live!

The first location has to be to my absolute favourite place – Botallack. I have always loved running trips here and taking friends and family to see this spectacular stretch of coast. The mining history is right in your face, and Cornish miners’ engineering prowess is at hits pinnacle with the Crowns engine houses perched right on the edge of the cliffs.

The geology here is quite spectacular too, and really unique. The interaction between intruding granites, the hydrothermal fluids they give off, and the surrounding country rock has created some really complex and exotic mineral assemblages. This hydrothermal alteration process, known as metasomatism, has created what are called skarns. Some of these are enriched in tin and have been historically mined.

Anyway! The first Geowalk took place on 28th March 2025, a date that will be celebrated for years to come. It was a fantastic morning with a great group of people from a variety of backgrounds. It was a pleasure to take them around this amazing site and allow them to see it in a new way. I am so grateful for them coming.

One of the things I loved most was that these people had never met before, and the discussions and general chatter during the walk created a sense of community amongst the group. It was a wonderful feeling that these Geowalks have brought these people together through a common passion and curiosity for the landscape around us.

As well as trying to explain the complicated geological processes that created the rocks around Botallack, we also explored the incredible industrial archaeology around Botallack. Part of the UNESCO Cornwall and West Devon Mining World Heritage Site, recognised for the region’s global contribution to industry, there are so many layers of mining history at Botallack to discover, and it is a great place to try and understand the toil and hardship those miners endured to extract the natural riches from the geology below.

If you want to come and discover the amazing landscape of the Tin Coast with me, well you can! Tin Coast Geowalks for future dates are now available to book on the website at https://www.cornwallgeologist.co.uk/guided-walks.

I also have lots of other locations in the pipeline as well, covering the amazing breadth of geology Cornwall has to offer around some of our incredible coast and countryside. Watch this space!After months of planning and building Cornwall Geowalks, I am stoked to finally get them live!