The way we were

In the spring of 1971 my parents moved from south London to rural Leicestershire. In previous years, the annual summer holiday had involved a short hop from Morden to Eastbourne, but two driving licences, acquired under the careful tuition of one Mr Stoddart, had opened up new territories. So, early one August morning, we set off by car into the unknown, heading for a chalet on the outskirts of Bude, owned by my parents' friend and former London landlady, Dorothy.

Inexperienced drivers with a distrust of traffic, they planned the trip to avoid motorways and dual carriageways, and drove all the way on minor roads. Some time after dark, they realised they were lost and, with their three children now asleep in the back, they stopped to ask for directions. As they approached the Tree Inn in Stratton near Bude, a dark-haired woman in her fifties walked uncertainly towards them. Her name was Vera Glover.

Yes, she could direct us to Penstowe Holiday Park. But she made it clear, with a twinkle in her eye, that one good turn deserved another. Vera hopped into the front seat and my mother squeezed into the back. She lifted the limp frame of one of us on to her lap as we set off north along the A39 towards Penstowe. My father dropped us off and then made the return trip to Vera's house. It was the start of a magical friendship.

For the next few years we visited Vera at her home, and when I was between the ages of three and seven she was the most exotic person in my life, as Cornish as cliffs and cream. Each year we would make a family pilgrimage to No 3 Railway Cottages. Vera and her husband Frank lived a stone's throw from Whitstone and Bridgerule railway station, which had felt the blow of Dr Beeching's unsentimental axe a few years before. Dad used to buy carrots and lettuces cultivated by her husband Frank on a patch of land across the road. Post-excavation, we would sit awe- and dumbstruck in her kitchen as she made us pasties for lunch, while cats tiptoed over the big black range. To me, Vera was the ruler of a strange foreign land, and we were her loyal subjects; it was like be ing entertained by the queen of Cornwall.

Now, over three decades later, I returned with my own family. For this holiday we were staying 20 minutes south along the A39 at Treworgie Barton, a farm near the village of St Genny's. Although very different in style to Railway Cottages or Penstowe Park, this was also a magical place. The converted dwellings around the central courtyard are named after former owners; Duchy after the Duchy of Cornwall, Bligh after a relative of Captain Bligh. In the centre two bronze herons bend for a drink at a fountain by some palms, and at night they are lit green.

On a blowy spring day, I took a muddy stroll past a property mentioned in the Domesday Book, and reputedly the third-oldest house in England. From here I wandered down the valley and into some steep and astonishingly beautiful woods that contained more primroses than I have ever seen. In a few weeks the sun-dappled floor will turn from yellow to violet, with the arrival of a spectacular blanket of bluebells.

In 1971 pleasures were even simpler. At Penstowe Park, we used to swim in the outdoor swimming pool, decadently, or so it felt at the time, even when it was raining. I can vividly recall doing widths one August afternoon as sudden hard rain drilled holes in the pool's surface. As all the other kids ran for cover, I floated in my armbands, fascinated by the flat surface of the water in the vertical downpour. It felt as if I were a drop of water in a puddle. My father only called us from the pool when it looked as if the storm might be accompanied by lightning.

When I returned to Penstowe Park a few weeks ago, it was much as I remembered. Nowadays, the manor house at which we could only gaze in excluded wonder is a leisure centre for guests, and while we used to spend the evenings playing Monopoly, entertainment is now provided in a 600-seat theatre. However, the chalet itself - No 25 in a development called The Glade - appeared to have been miniaturised. I remember a huge living room with an open-plan kitchen at the rear, and enormous front windows, but the reality was a tiny flat-roofed building with a 10ft-square living room and a kitchen and bathroom no wider than a table.

My sisters and I slept in one room, my parents in the other. One day they left me in the perilous care of my older sisters and, perching on the front window ledge with no one around to tell me not to, I overbalanced backwards and landed in a bin outside. At the tender age of four, I couldn't work out if I would be in trouble when my parents returned.

Thirty years on, I retraced the path to the outdoor swimming pool. It was closed for the winter and I hopped over the wall. There was the sign that used to fascinate me - "maximum depth 6ft", the same height as my father - and the pool was still surrounded by a low wall decorated with blue mosaic tiles. As I tried to recall feelings from the time, nature provided a reminder: a swift downpour drenched me and the pool once again.

Running for cover, I jumped in the car and left Penstowe for Bridgerule on the Devon-Cornwall border in search of Vera. A woman in the post office directed me to take the main road and follow signs for the industrial estate. I knocked on the door of No 3 before a neighbour sent me around the back. She told me that Vera has passed away some years ago, but that her son was out the back in the garden. No less Cornish than his mother, John Glover has the sort of smiling, contented eyes that you'd expect to see on a multi-millionaire. All white hair and warmth, he is just the sort of man you'd want to live next door to.

I spent a rich half-hour doing exactly what my family did 30 years ago. The range was gone, but we sat in the same kitchen as John reminisced about his parents. He talked about Vera's kindly and protective good nature, and recalled the time that the next-door neighbour dashed round in distress when the club man called for his weekly payment. John and Vera stood at the door as the neighbour hid in the cupboard by the door. "You wouldn't frighten her," John recalls. Sitting unhurried over coffee and biscuits with a kindly man who hadn't known that I existed until a few minutes ago was like looking into the eyes of my past.

As we got up to leave, I asked John if he had a photograph of his mother. He replied that he hadn't, but sent me off to the nearby village of Pyworthy to meet his brother Peter, who had. Peter was every bit as open and welcoming. We chatted about his parents and looked at a picture taken on his wedding day.

As I stood on his doorstep to leave, Peter suddenly recalled a far-distant conversation with his mother. He remembered her speaking to him once of a young family who used to visit every summer. She wondered what had happened to them and if they'd ever come back. Sorry it took so long, Vera, but we have. We have.

TRAVELLER'S GUIDE

GETTING THERE

There is no train station in Bude. First Great Western (08457 000 125; www.firstgreat western.co.uk) serves Exeter St Davids, where you connect with a coach service to Bude (around 1 hour 50 minutes).

STAYING THERE

Penstowe Park (01288 321 354; www.penstoweleisure.co.uk), Kilkhampton, Bude, Cornwall.

Treworgie Barton Holiday Cottages (01840 230 233; www.treworgie.co.uk), St Genny's, North Cornwall. Duchy Cottage sleeps six and costs from £398 to £944 per week, dependent on season.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Bude Tourist Information (01288 354 240; www.north-cornwall.com)