Visiting PK Porthcurno museum and Porthcurno Beach
While N isn’t that thrilled by days out nowadays, he does like 2 things. A castle and anything that touches on history, in particular the World Wars. So PK Porthcurno museum jumped out as somewhere we needed to visit. It’s the Museum of Global Communications and is right next to Porthcurno Beach too. A chance to visit both places at the same time.
If you’re not keen on narrow windy British roads, then you might want to avoid travelling to Porthcurno. The roads are definitely a little tight with small laybys occasionally. Even aiming for 9.30 arrival, we had to back up and breathe in a few times on the drive. It’s a similar route to visit the Minack Theatre which is just above in the cliffs. But we couldn’t get tickets for there at the times I wanted, and I thought N might not be interested in seeing that.
There are 2 decent sized car parks at PK Porthcurno. You can park in either for the museum or beach. In high summer I suspect car parking will be more of a problem, with beach goers increasing. You can Ringo and pay in advance, or pay when you leave at the machines. If you’re visiting the museum you can get your car parking back when you pay your museum entry. We arrived before opening time so we could briefly visit the beach too.
Porthcurno Beach
Porthcurno Beach is just a short walk along flower and wildlife lined paths, taking about 5-10 minutes from the car park. The southwest coastal walk also circles around the area. The walk to the beach takes you past the lifeguard hut. Choose either down some fairly steep steps to the left, or down the sandy slope to the right.
The beach is a beautiful sandy bay with the cliffs either side (and some steps leading up the cliff if you want to head the hard way up). The sea is calmer in summer, but watch young children as the beach shelves steeply, and there are strong currents.
When we were there it was very quiet. A few families were arriving as we left, plus some obviously hiking the coastal path.
It’s a lovely peaceful beach (you may recognise it from tv show Poldark’s Nampara Cove in season 1). We could have spent more time here. But just seeing the sea and enjoying the quiet was lovely.
It works the legs walking back up to the car park again. Toilets are in the car park, and the beach cafe is that direction too.
PK Porthcurno – Museum of Global Communications
With Porthcurno being one of the worldwide telegraph stations back in the day, PK was its call sign, and still called PK Porthcurno today. On the walk from the car park, the tone is set by a display of an Anderson bunker.
The museum takes you through its original use, how the first undersea telegraph cables were laid out, through the work done during the World Wars, and how the valley was protected by troops.
While there we learnt how new workers were trained, and how they had to adapt as time and communication methods moved on. I was beside myself looking the mobile phones through the years display too.
As you move through the first part of the museum it’s all so interactive. Perfect for children and adults. We enjoyed trying out Morse code messages, and semaphore. N even got to test his physics knowledge of magnets. Plus we played with lasers and everything else comms themed. This is the type of thing I love about museums – it brings science to life, and for older children they can relate it to their existing knowledge without them thinking about it being school work.
We enjoyed sitting through some of the video information displays, but unfortunately didn’t quite time it right to see any of the demonstrations that go on each day.
Once we’d done the main museum displays, it was time to head to the World War 2 bunker underground in the cliffs. This was the secret bunker that hid the telegraph station in World Water 2, where Allied communications were protected by armed guards and bomb-proof doors.
In the bunker you can see all the different telegraph machines, as well as old school ‘servers’. There’s also a workshop where they still do repairs today.
The sheer number of machines was much larger than we’d anticipated. But there’s also displays about what they did in the war, the dangers, and information about the workers staying there. There’s audio displays where you can hear about different people’s lives and roles, and what happened to prisoners of war.
Then the corridors take you round to more modern information and how communications have changed.
At the end you can choose whether to use the Escape Tunnel up to the top of the cliff. You choose a hard hat, then have to climb 120 steps.
At the top, you can see across the valley. (The vegetation does need trimming in some places). There’s an alternative sign post to that at Lands End, and as we were the only people out there, plenty of time to take photos. Maybe not with the rat sitting next to me as I nearly leant on the side before noticing it.
If you’ve got young children there’s also a play area outside, and some lovely gardens to enjoy. Not forgetting the cafe and gift shop.
I suspect it PK Porthcurno would get busier in the summer holidays or wet days, and later in the day. It was fairly quiet as we walked around, although we did have to wait to use the Morse code machines.
Usually we whizz round museums and days out trips, but at PK Portcurno, even N said there were plenty of other things he could have seen there (if he wasn’t getting hungry!).
PK Porthcurno Museum of Global communications is definitely worth a visit. And if you visit Cornwall frequently, gift aid your ticket to turn it into an annual pass.
Check out some of my other Cornwall posts: