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| In medieval times there were two towns
on opposite banks of the River Looe. East
Looe includes the fishing harbour, the main shopping centre and the
sandiest beach. West
Looe is quieter, but also has shops, restaurants and hotels and leads
to Hannafore with its fine views of Looe Island. The two towns are
joined together by a bridge across the river. |
FORUM
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us your memories and views of Looe - it's quick, easy & free to
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INDEX
Click on topic
to select:
Accommodation
Advice
Attractions
Boat owners
Buses & Trains
Churches
Cinema
Ferries, Fowey & Polruan
Facilities
Forum
Guest Book
History
Lions
Links
Location
Looe Island
Luggers
News
Polperro
RC Churches
Running
Sailing
Sclerder Abbey
Shops
Staying
Talland Bay
Walks
Wrecks
Most recent development -
6 October 2008
© 1999 - 2008 www.looe.org |
| www.looe.org was launched on 1 October 1999
and aims to serve both visitors and residents.
|
Website access statistics:
June 2008
Hits: 289,840
Pages: 53,349
Visits: 21,632
May 2008
Hits: 190,326
Pages: 41,587
Visits: 20,585
April 2008
Hits: 161,428
Pages: 36,021
Visits: 18,010
|
EVENTS
If you are organising an event in or around Looe make sure it is listed
on this website's Events Diary. Visit our Online
Forum and post the details yourself NOW! |
|
Take
a punt on powerboat racing
Visit our Online Forum
for details of how you can try out your skills as a power boat racer
for minimal cost on 11th & 12th October - and the proceeds are
going to a good cause - the St. John's Ambulance Brigade - click
here
www.looe.org - news - 6 October 2008 |
Summer
2008 - Best forgotten?
 "The
best weather ever" said the Master of Ceremonies at Looe Lions
Club's Coast and Country - the 10th Vintage and Classic Transport
Display - glorious sun and temperatures in the mid-20s Celsius. The
crowds enjoyed a giant all-day Car Boot sale with more than 180 stalls
and a festival of vintage and classic cars, tractors and agricultural
machinery, steam and stationary engines and even a magnificent (and
loca) prize winning shire horse. The event marked the opening of Looe
Carnival Week. The next day's "Traditional Floral Dance"
procession through the town with dancers and St. Pinnock and Liskeard
Silver Bands band played to  a
smaller audience due to rain and, sad to say, from then on everything
seemed to go downhill weatherwise.
The major public event of the August Bank Holiday,
the Morval Steam Rally, was cancelled even before the date
arrived due to extreme rainfall and waterlogged fields at the show
site. Another victim of the unseasonable weather has been the Lion's
Club Car Boot Sales normally held at West Waylands Farm near Talland
Bay, between Looe & Polperro every Sunday morning in summer. Again
the state of the fields following a visit by Billy Smart's Circus
at a time when there was a lot of rain meant that the organisers had
to cancel several successive Sundays' sales - a practically unprecedented
event - and the Lion's funds for their good works during the winter
are now depleted as a result.
The heavy rain caused a landslide near to the
bridge at West Looe in which a van was buried in mud and stone
and its driver had a lucky escape, whilst a smaller slip partially
blocked the only road to Hanafore (see our Online
Forum for more info). And sadly, other than a good weekend
in late September there was not much sign of the "Indian Summer"
we were expecting in compensation for the monsoons of August. However
one thing's practically certain - summer 2009 is going to be much
better!
www.looe.org - news - 6 October 2008
Go to the
Looe Lions' website for more information about the 2008
Carnival. Click on photos for larger versions.
|
West
Looe Post Office listed for closure
Under its rationalisaion plan for Cornwall announced today, West Looe
is set to lose its post office, which is located in the Spar shop
in Princes Square. The other Looe post offices (in Fore Street and
on the Barbican) will remain in operation. In total 59 post offices
in Cornwall are to be closed as part of the Post Office's rationalisation
programme designed to cut the huge losses the company is currently
making. Other local post offices which have survived the cuts are
Nomansland (Bindown Stores), Pelynt & Lanreath. Polruan and Lerryn
are to have "outreach" services. There is now to be a period
of public consultation about the proposed closures and other changes
before the final plans are confirmed, but experience elsewhere has
been that it is difficult to save a post office designated for closure.
Full
details of Cornwall PO closures programme
www.looe.org - news - 15 July 2008
What do you think? Please use our Online
Forum to air your views |
New
Year Fireworks Saved - but venue changes
The Cornish Guardian today reports that Looe's famous New Year
Fireworks Display has been saved. It was to have been discontinued
due to Caradon Council's lack of funds, but a new sponsor has been
found. However, for health & safety reasons, the venue is to change
from the Banjo Pier to the Millpool - a move which has already been
criticised. See page 7 of today's Cornish Guardian for the
full story and visit our Online
Forum to join in the debate. Thanks to Looelocal
of the Cornish Guardian for keeping everyone informed about
this. 9 July 2008 |
Nelson
returns - in spirit at least
 For
many years Looe had a popular & much-loved regular visitor to
its harbour - a seal called Nelson (because he had lost one eye in
an injury or accident). Sadly Nelson has gone to the great ocean in
the sky but now he is fittingly commemorated by a handsome life-size
statue in the harbour which was formally unveiled this week by Sir
Robin Knox-Johnston, the famous sailor. Local sculptor Suzie Marsh
gave her services in making the sculpture free of charge and the costs
of casting and siting the bronze statue have been met by grants and
donations from many charitable and other bodies and by individuals.
Click on photo for large version.
www.looe.org - news - 31 May & 4 June 2008 |
 Virtuoso
Performance Daily
It's a daily event that probably few people even notice, but no less
remarkable for that. What is it? The daily delivery by articulated
pantechnicon to the Somerfield supermarket in East Looe. Because the
store is located a long way up Fore Street, a narrow, winding street,
with nowhere to turn, the Somerfield delivery truck has to make its
delivery by reversing 250m along this narrow and curving street which
also has other traffic in both directions and the occasional illegally
parked vehicle to contend with as well. Generally Somerfield's drivers
do this completely unaided and so expertly that hardly anyone notices.
This must be the nightmare delivery run to be sent on first time,
but when they have mastered it drivers must feel a great sense of
achievement and pride in their driving skills. Next time you are buying
your groceries at Somerfield spare a thought for the skill of the
drivers on the Looe delivery!
More photos: 2
3 4
5 6
- also, click on photo above for large version.
www.looe.org - 22 May 2008 |
Was
that an ECHO on the BEACH?
Those who know Looe will have recognised many
locations in and around the town in the recent ITV1 drama soap - Echo
Beach. Those who don't know Looe but learn that this is
where much of the TV drama was shot might well expect to find big
surf beaches on the door-step. Well there are nice beaches, some sandy,
some rocky, and it is certainly scenic round here, so no wonder the
programme makers picked picturesque Looe, but big surf beaches are
just about the only thing that Looe can't claim to have (most of the
surf beaches are on the north coast of Cornwall - Looe is on the warmer,
gentler south coast). Come and see
for yourself! |
LIFE
ABOARD A CORNISH FISHING LUGGER
 The
last days of working fishing luggers in Cornwall are vividly captured
in a new book by former Looe fisherman Paul Greenwood. His
frank account of the hardships he encountered at sea as a young crewman
aboard the lugger Iris in the 1960s is a brilliant evocation
of a bygone age that contrasts with modern conditions in the fishing
industry today.
In Once Aboard A Cornish Lugger, the
author describes how he overcame sea-sickness and learned his job
on deck working the nets and lines alongside four other crewmen aboard
the Iris, skippered by Frank ‘Moogie’ Pengelly, the last lugger skipper
left in the port of Looe. In the four and a half years he spent aboard
the Iris, Paul Greenwood endured fatigue, cold and wet, often in rough
weather while working night and day hauling nets and lines. “Those
four years that I worked with ‘Moogie’ set me up well for the rest
of my sea-going career,” he says, “because nothing subsequently ever
seemed as hard or as physically demanding as the time I spent working
on the deck of the Iris.”
Visit our new page on Cornish
luggers which has details of how and where you can buy this
new book - click here |
| Finding
the Lord where potatoes once were stored - if your idea
of a church congegation is a faithful few of advancing years then
you've clearly not heard about the Grace Community Church,
an independent Evangelical church, which meets in a converted farmhouse
and potato barn at Morval near Looe and has over 240 worshippers
each Sunday. Interested? More information on the church and its
service times may be found on www.gracecc.org.uk
or phone 01503 240930 (office hours) / 01503 220616 (outside office
hours non-pastoral calls only). |
| Sorry! We no
longer answer individual queries due to the high volumes involved.
The answers to most questions are on this website already! If not,
try one of the telephone numbers below or why not ask your questions
in our Online Forum |
| Useful Telephone Numbers:
|
|
Looe Tourist Info Office - 01503
262072
Looe Harbour Commissioners - 01503 262839
Looe Town Council - 01503 262255
Caradon District Council - 01579 341000 |
Any others? Let us know
If you contact any of these numbers, please mention you found
their number on www.Looe.org |
|
To contact us: email "looeone"
at "looe.org"
Please note: this contact
address is strictly only for contributors and potential advertisers
- unfortunately we do not have the resources to answer individual
queries or supply information and such requests are deleted - sorry!)
Try posting your question in our new Online
Forum |
A
date for your diary! Yes, it is a long way ahead, but New Year's Eve
is Looe's big night - so note it now & don't forget
Partying, fancy dress and fireworks at midnight
- one of the very top places in the UK to celebrate the New Year.
Did you have a great night out on last New Year's Eve?
If so send us your photos.
|
|
Click on image to visit this agency's website
Place mouse arrow on photos to see captions
Click on images for larger photos
Place mouse arrow on photos to see captions
Click on images for larger photos
The top photo (of E Looe beach) is the copyright of Tim Johnson, others
copyright www.looe.org
 Local
history and a good read - visit our website
to buy online any of our many Cornish & other titles |
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