Hidden away among the high cliffs north of Crackington Haven is the hamlet of St Gennys and its beautiful medieval church.
From the churchyard you can see Lundy Island on a clear day, recalling an old weather-forecasting rhyme, 'Lundy high sign of dry, Lundy plain sign of rain'. Sometime in the middle of the 7th century a group of Celtic monks settled in this isolated place and established a simple church.
The monks probably came from St Kew, near Wadebridge further south along the coast, or from St Kew's mother church at the abbey of Llandough in Ireland. Their choice of this remote location was not as odd as it sounds, for just outside the churchyard you can still see an ancient well fed by an underground spring, so the monks would have had access to fresh water. That water would soon become a holy well, dedicated to St Gennys.
There were no less than four Iron Age forts in the area, so there would have been a reasonable local population to preach to. That first church probably consisted of little more than the holy well, a stone cross, and simple huts for the monks. In the church is a very old and worn circular stone which may possibly be the original Celtic cross head. There may have been a small stone church here in the late 10th century after King Athelstan annexed Cornwall. We do know that sometime around 1154 the church was granted to Launceston Priory. The present building dates to the 15th century, but it retains parts of an earlier Norman church. The lowest two stages of the tower are 12th century, and there is Norman stonework in the chancel walls. Only five other towers in Cornwall have Norman stonework. There is a simple reason for this; most churches did not have towers at all until the late medieval period. The tower is exceptionally short, reaching just 22 feet high. You can see the Norman tower arch from inside the church and deeply splayed Norman windows in the tower walls. The font is from about 1170 and is carved from Tintagel greenstone. The square font bowl is carved with blind arcading and is supported by four corner posts and a large central column.
At the east end of the north aisle is St Gregory's Chapel. On the north wall is a touching memorial. . It commemorates the nine children of William and Margaret Yeo who died in infancy. The memorial is dated 1693 and reads:
Reader, Nine Lambs in their great shepherd sleepe, To rise againe, And stand among his sheep. May the great three in one, for ever blest, Bring the surviving three To endless rest Sic transet Gloria Mundi.
The posted coordinates take you to Pauline and Stephen Nunn memorial stone.
To find the cache you will need to use this formula :
Last digit of Stephen's year of death = A
Last digit of Pauline's birth year minus the first digit of same year = B
Third digit of Stephen's birth year = C
Second digit of Pauline's year of birth minus last of same year = D
Second digit of Paulene's year of birth = E
CHECKSUM ABCDE = 29
The cache can be found at : N50 44. A B C W004 37.D A E
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http://churchmicro.co.uk/
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http://www.15ddv.me.uk/geo/cm/index.html