Kernow Tours

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✨Best Private tours of Cornwall.
✨6 or 8 hour unique guided vehicle tours.
✨Choose from our 'menu' OR go bespoke.
✨Cornish local tour guides - loving Cornwall.
✨Check Google reviews & Trip Advisor .
✨www.kernowtours.co.uk

We spotted a sticker on a vehicle in Cornwall last week.Respect:-“Crimp My Ride.”And, naturally, underneath it was a pic...
05/09/2026

We spotted a sticker on a vehicle in Cornwall last week.

Respect:-

“Crimp My Ride.”

And, naturally, underneath it was a picture of a Cornish pasty.

THIS is the kinda thing that tells you you’ve arrived in Kernow.

Elsewhere, people might customise their vehicles with flames, racing stripes or something involving exhaust pipes.

Here, apparently, we CRIMP our rides.

seriously, though: Crimp My Ride was one of the names chosen by the good people of Cornwall for the county’s fleet of gritters — a suitably Cornish combination of motoring, winter roads and pastry engineering. It even made the final 25 names, because apparently we couldn’t resist putting a pasty into absolutely everything.

WE APPROVE!

After all, why merely drive around Cornwall when you can make a statement?

Crimp my ride.
Crimp my pasty.
(Just don’t crimp it on the top.)

There are some things even tour guides are prepared to argue about...

Do YOU want to learn about the REAL Cornwall?Some very lovely and heartfelt reviews have come in for us over the last co...
04/09/2026

Do YOU want to learn about the REAL Cornwall?

Some very lovely and heartfelt reviews have come in for us over the last couple of weeks.

We see it as being a true privilege to guide visitors through the heart and soul of Cornwall...

Guests that we have guided several years ago have travelled thousands of miles to return to Cornwall to explore more, as well as their family and friends coming over and booking our Services by their recommendation.

The beauty and magic of Cornwall is so compelling.

We introduce guests to Kernow a way that facilitates a meaningful CONNECTION to the place.

With the right guides, a regular holiday can turn into the start of a love affair for the place.

It's EMOTIONAL...

THANK YOU and GRATITUDE to the hundreds of visitors that have left us positive online reviews across Google / TripAdvisor etc.
It means SO much.

Blessings 🙏

This striking monument located in the garden of the Flying Angel Centre in Falmouth Docks is a poignant tribute known as...
04/09/2026

This striking monument located in the garden of the Flying Angel Centre in Falmouth Docks is a poignant tribute known as the "U-Boat Watch" sculpture.
(we pass it regularly when going up to Falmouth Docks to pick up visitors)

The monument honors the brave individuals who kept Britain supplied during its darkest hours and serves as a dedicated memorial to the 30,248 Merchant Navy seamen who lost their lives during service in the Second World War, as well as the 4,654 personnel reported missing.

The sculpture was created by talented local artist Graham Hall amdnwas officially unveiled at the Mission to Seafarers garden in 2014, with the ceremony attended by Arctic Convoy veterans.

The piece depicts two life-sized lookouts standing at a ship's railing, intently scanning the horizon with binoculars for enemy submarines. The realistic staging is enhanced by actual orange lifebuoys placed at the base, labeled with the names of Royal Fleet Auxiliary vessels such as RFA Lyme Bay and RFA Mounts Bay, anchoring the historical tribute in real naval history.

we love it.

It's a poignant reminder of those who paid the ultimate price at sea during a very turbulent time indeed...

Yew!We spotted this ACE little greeting in mosaic form on someone’s doorstep in the fine old market town of Penzance rec...
04/09/2026

Yew!

We spotted this ACE little greeting in mosaic form on someone’s doorstep in the fine old market town of Penzance recently.

Now, if you’re not familiar with Cornish dialect, you might reasonably assume that somebody had simply forgotten how to spell you. But no — “Yew!” is a proper Cornish greeting, used much like “Hi!” or “Hello!” — and particularly associated with the West of Cornwall. (Mylor Parish Council)

It’s one of those gert simple bits of local speech that tells you something about Cornwall. You can learn all the formal Cornish phrases you like, but sometimes a cheerful “Yew!” is all that’s required.

Plus, we LOVE the idea of putting it on your doorstep.

It’s practically a permanent invitation to the world:

Yew! Come in.

Although, knowing Cornwall, there’s every chance the next bit of the conversation would be:

“Yew boy! Wasson?”

And then you’d better have half an hour to spare...

IF you know...Yew! Kernow!

And... after a lovely sunny day on Monday, Tuesday's touring was typified by showery and mizzly weather here in Kernow.I...
04/09/2026

And... after a lovely sunny day on Monday, Tuesday's touring was typified by showery and mizzly weather here in Kernow.

If anything, it ENHANCED the experience for these folks!
(there is NOTHING quite like approaching a 5000-year-old stone circle through the mist on a windswept remote Cornish field!)

Having spent several days walking around the south-west coast path here in Cornwall they fancy their day exploring some of the inland ancient wonders that are so abundant here - this is where WE come in!
(they were such great company and embraced the history lessons fully😂)

The 'Stones and Bones' 6 HOUR TOUR:-
-Very special, sacred and ‘off the beaten path’.
-Far from the crowds, even in high season.
-A unique and spellbinding experience!

✨Men-An-Tol – bronze age holed stone.
✨Lanyon Quoit Neolithic portal tomb.
✨'Tin Mine' country & tales of disaster.
✨St Just – most Westerly village in Britain.
✨Ballowal Barrow – ancient funerary mound.
✨Cape Cornwall.
✨Medieval Churches and ancient Celtic crosses.
✨Boscawen-un neolithic stone circle.
✨Carn Euny Iron age village, ‘fogou’ & holy well.
✨Sancreed Beacon archaeological area.
✨Home.

please note! A couple of these entries sites do involve some walking to and from the vehicle. Approximately 15 minutes each way for a couple of the sites. They are very much off the beaten path and in fact places where many locals have never gone to visit....

PLUS : SO MANY points of interest en route – some visible from vehicle, others just moments from the car. Wayside crosses, burial mounds, landmarks, mining setts and engine houses, menhirs, barrows and even fogou are all pointed out and key historical information given. Your very own ancient sites tour of Cornwall!

Cornwall isn't all about sunny days and beaches...

Scratch the surface on a blustery day and you'll be mesmerised by what we an share with you...

Call Conrad on 07762 260274 to start the conversation.

One of the great responsibilities of being a tour guide is knowing where the toilets are.This becomes considerably more ...
04/09/2026

One of the great responsibilities of being a tour guide is knowing where the toilets are.

This becomes considerably more important when you’re walking with guests from the harbour to the church, and suddenly one member of the party announces that they require a rather more immediate encounter with modern sanitation.

Unfortunately, we were somewhat out in the sticks. The sort of sticks where the nearest café, pub or public convenience seemed to be several geological periods away.

But then, like a small miracle in a field, salvation appeared.

A compostable toilet.

It turns out the local parish has been thinking ahead and has provided an eco-friendly little convenience for passing walkers. No porcelain palace, no scented hand towels and certainly no queue of tourists — just a rather ingenious wooden loo sitting quietly in the Cornish countryside, doing its bit for the environment.

Our guest was extremely grateful.

And we were reminded once again that a good Kernow Tour isn’t just about ancient churches, forgotten history and spectacular landscapes.

Sometimes, it’s about knowing where to stop for a wee.

And on this occasion, the parish had quite literally got our backsides covered.

If you know, you Kernow 😇

For generations, St Ives was a town where the sea wasn’t simply something to look at - it was something you worked on, a...
04/09/2026

For generations, St Ives was a town where the sea wasn’t simply something to look at - it was something you worked on, argued with, depended upon and, occasionally, feared.

So it seems wholely appropriate that St Ives now has a new piece of public art celebrating the people who made their living from it. The St Ives Mariners Memorial, recently installed on Smeaton’s Pier, is the work of Cornish sculptor Tom Leaper. Cast in bronze and standing around eight feet tall, it shows two pilchard fishermen working together to haul in the net and land their catch.

Inevitably, being Kernow, there's more to it than two fishermen and a fishing net.

In the 19th century, St Ives was a major fishing port. Hundreds of boats worked from the town, with pilchards providing food, employment and oil for lighting. A successful catch could quite literally mean meat, money and light, all in one night — a wonderfully succinct description of how important the sea was to the community.

Tom’s sculpture was inspired by an old photograph of St Ives fishermen and was created in the former Methodist Chapel opposite Penwith Gallery — a building with its own connection to the town’s fishing families. The project itself took several years and was funded largely through the sale of miniature bronze versions of the sculpture.

We like the fact that it now stands looking out across the very waters where those fishermen once worked.

Visitors often see St Ives as the home of artists, galleries and beautiful beaches. And quite rightly so. But before the painters arrived with their easels, there were fishermen, boatbuilders, net makers and families whose lives rose and fell with the tide.

This is their St Ives too.

And on a Kernow Tour, it’s another reminder that sometimes the most interesting stories are standing quietly beside the ones everybody came to see.

An interesting comparison…This image shows a famous vintage Great Western Railway (GWR) travel advertisement originally ...
03/09/2026

An interesting comparison…

This image shows a famous vintage Great Western Railway (GWR) travel advertisement originally created in 1907 by artist Arthur Gunn.

The poster was commissioned by the GWR as part of a highly successful marketing campaign to brand Cornwall as the "Cornish Riviera".

The main objective was to encourage wealthy British citizens to spend their holiday money domestically rather than traveling to continental Europe!

The idea was largely to promote domestic pride and keep tourism inward - being proud of the assets of this country...

The poster places maps of the Cornish peninsula and Italy side-by-side. It uses strategic orientation and scaling to make Cornwall appear remarkably similar in shape to the famous "boot" of Italy.

Well...whilst we KNOW Kernow is a UNIQUE visitor destination which does feature palm trees and a surprisingly mild microclimate due to the Gulf Stream, we can't help but chuckle when we see such posters from an anachronistic age...
In reality, Italy is roughly 85 times larger, significantly warmer, and features entirely different topography—making this poster a classic example of creative Edwardian-era marketing embellishment.

Fair play.

We don't NEED to bend the truth nowadays, though...

Rather than just UK visitors coming to Cornwall, we have people from ALL OVER THE WORLD making the journey here as they have heard that it's so special.
They're NOT wrong.

The Climate, sure.

But it's so much more than that...

And. Like we say - if you know, you KERNOW 😉

The sun SHONE here in Kernow on Monday - and we had the privilege of guiding this lovely family around West Cornwall... ...
03/09/2026

The sun SHONE here in Kernow on Monday - and we had the privilege of guiding this lovely family around West Cornwall... all the way from Seattle and their first time here!

There are certain moments on a Kernow Tour when you realise the day has rather exceeded expectations.

This family had never been to Cornwall before, let alone the world-class Minack Theatre | Cornwall’s Iconic Outdoor Theatre so we brought them down to this extraordinary slice of Cornish madness - a theatre carved into the cliffs above Porthcurno, where the Atlantic provides the scenery and the weather is apparently allowed to make its own rules.

And then, as they sat enjoying their lunch in the sunshine (yes, in September...this is Cornwall, after all), Mark Harandon (this Tour Guides old English teacher and now a firm friend) appeared on the stage as Billy Rawlings, Rowena Cade’s gardener and one of the men who helped turn this wild piece of cliffside into a theatre. Billy has quite a story to tell, and Mark brings him wonderfully to life.

So there we were: a family seeing the Minack for the very first time, lunch in hand, the sea sparkling below, and a Cornish gardener from the 1930s telling them how it all began.

Not a bad way to spend a September lunchtime.

Theatre, history, sunshine and a proper job decent oggy courtesy of Ann's Pasties - Cornwall does like to show off occasionally!

Would YOU like to learn about the real Cornwall?We always enjoy taking guests to some of Cornwall’s wonderful castles, a...
03/09/2026

Would YOU like to learn about the real Cornwall?

We always enjoy taking guests to some of Cornwall’s wonderful castles, and when we’re crossing from the north coast towards the south, we will often suggest a little detour to Restormel Castle.

Perched above the Fowey Valley, this extraordinary circular castle dates largely from the late 13th century and became one of the great residences of the Earls of Cornwall. The Black Prince stayed here twice, including Christmas in 1362, and the castle was closely connected with Lostwithiel and the enormously lucrative medieval Cornish tin industry.

It’s a brilliant Kernow Tours stop because it doesn’t require half a day to appreciate. You can climb the battlements, explore the remarkably intact circular walls and look out across the beautiful Fowey Valley and, with a little imagination, picture the place when it was a rather grand royal residence rather than the crumbling yet atmospheric ruin we see today. A small detour, a big story, and some splendid views. What’s not to like?

Drop us a line to begin the conversation about where we can take you on your very own Cornish adventure!

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Penzance

Telephone

+447762260274

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