Schools might be going back, but summer is far from over. Enjoy fewer crowds, warmer seas, cider orchards and more!
Ask anybody who lives in Cornwall which month is their favourite, and hardly any of them will say August.
For a true local, September wins every time.
It’s the month when the county seems to let its breath out: the traffic thins, the light turns golden, and hotspots that have been buried in crowds for the last two months are accessible once more.
And the best bit is that the weather is often just as good as in July and August, and the sea is a good two degrees warmer (which makes all the difference, let us tell you!).
So, here’s our case for the best month of the Cornish year, and everything we’ll be getting up to this September.
Enjoying the highlights in peace
The best bit about September in Cornwall is that all the famous (for good reason) places that were heaving three weeks ago are still just as lovely – and you can now park at them!
Fowey and Polperro are the obvious ones. Come in September and you can wander the beautiful lanes, admire the overflowing window boxes, get a table outside in the sun and watch the boats without peering through a crowd. Charlestown, with its Georgian harbour and usually a tall ship or two tied up, is also calm and lovely by late September.
The gardens and houses are the same story. Lanhydrock has nearly a thousand acres of parkland to lose yourself in, and its acers and sweet gums turn properly spectacular later in the season. The Lost Gardens of Heligan put on lots of events throughout the autumn, and the Eden Project is a perfect wet-day answer too.
And let’s not forget the beaches. Par Sands is a vast stretch of sand that empties out completely once the schools go back, and at Readymoney Cove in Fowey the summer dog restrictions come off on 1 September, which makes it a perfect option if you’ve brought the dog.
Getting in the sea (yes, really!)
This is the bit people find hardest to believe. The sea takes the whole summer to warm up, reaching its warmest in late August and then holding onto that heat for weeks afterwards.
Which means September is genuinely the best swimming month of the year, and you’ll very often have the water to yourself while you’re at it. Talland Bay is ten minutes down the lane from us, Lansallos a little further, and both are quiet by the end of the first week of September.
If you’re a surfer, this time of year is also when Cornwall comes alive. The Atlantic swells start swinging round to the north-west and pushing proper storm pulses towards the coast. So, the north coast beaches begin firing after a summer of gentler waves. Try Polzeath or Newquay – just under an hour from Old Lanwarnick – for the best September waves.
Soaking up cider season (literally!)
Cornwall smells different in the autumn, and a lot of that is apples.
Cornish Orchards is ten minutes from us at Duloe, on a Duchy farm in the Looe valley, and it’s one of our favourite afternoon activities. There’s a farm shop, and you can sit outside with a cold cider and a view of the countryside while the dog snoozes under the table. Dogs are welcome in the shop and the outdoor areas, though not on the guided tours around the orchard, while the press and the bottling hall are firmly for grown-ups!
Just up the road towards Lostwithiel, Haye Farm has been making cider on the same land since the thirteenth century, which makes them one of the oldest cider makers in the world! They take visitors by arrangement, but if you can’t get there in person, you’ll find their bottles in Lerryn River Stores, Purely Cornish in Looe and other local shops. Picking one up on the way home from a walk just feels like the right thing to do at this time of year.
And if you want to make a proper day of it, the National Trust’s Mother Orchard at Cotehele holds 125 different apple varieties across three hundred-odd trees. Planted as a living library of Tamar Valley apples, they have names like Cornish Honeypinnick, Pig’s Nose and Lemon Pippin. Makes a change from a Granny Smith!
Eating the best seafood of the year
Crab and lobster spend the summer growing fast and shedding their shells, and it’s only by autumn that they’ve properly filled the new ones out. The result is that a Looe crab in September has considerably more meat in it – result! Mussels from St Austell Bay have also been fattening up and are at their best now, and squid start moving inshore.
Plus, September means it’s time to start gearing up for oyster season! The Fal oyster season opens on 1st October, and though it’s not strictly September, it’s pretty close!
The Fal is the last oyster fishery in Europe still worked entirely under sail, by gaff-rigged cutters with no engines and no winches, because a local order passed in 1863 banned them and nobody has ever got round to changing it. Five hundred years of doing it the hard way is worth celebrating. Which is exactly what happens at the Falmouth Oyster Festival on 8–11th October, only about an hour from us.
Foraging for wild food
The hedgerows come good in September, and if you’ve got children this is the cheapest afternoon out in Cornwall.
Blackberries are everywhere from late summer into early October, and the lanes around us are thick with them. Just bring your Tupperware and not only can you gorge as you pick, but you’ll have enough left over for a homemade crumble back at your cottage or glamping pod.
Sloes start coming on in September, too. Pick them, freeze them overnight to split the skins, and pop them in a bottle of local gin (we recommend Foy Gin by Fowey Distilleries just down the road). Then you’ll have your own Cornish sloe gin ready by Christmas. That’s presents sorted!
A gentle word on mushrooms: autumn woodland is full of them and they’re beautiful to look at, but identification is genuinely difficult and some are dangerous. We’d photograph them rather than pick them, or go out with a proper guided forager. We recommend Wild Walks South West or Totally Wild UK, who both run guided foraging days in Cornwall.
Spotting seal pups, swallows and starlings
There are seals all along this coast and a well-known colony out at Looe Island, and September is when the beaches below the cliffs start filling up with fat white pups.
We love to watch them from the cliffs, or a nice distance back on the beach, for hours, playing together and lounging in the sun. That’s the life, isn’t it!
Remember – seals may be cute, but they’re still wild animals! Please respect their space and follow these important rules: Use binoculars or a zoom lens rather than getting close. Never get between a seal and the sea, or a mother and her pup (it won’t end well for you). Please always keep dogs on a lead. And never fly a drone anywhere near them. For more information, read this useful guide: Seal Pups – A Complete Guide by Padstow Sealife Safaris.
September also brings the beginning of the migration season. You’ll see swallows and martins gathering on the wires in their thousands before they go – a sight to behold. And you might even get to see a murmuration from the fields at Old Lanwarnick – where the starlings fly and swoop together creating stunning patterns in the sky. A proper sunset show!
Live it up with the locals in Looe
The Looe Weekender on 18–20 September is our favourite local event of the whole year. It’s a completely free music festival which takes over both sides of the river. There are something like ninety musical sets across a dozen venues and pop-up stages. No wristbands, no fields, no queuing – move over, Glastonbury!
Beyond that, Lostwithiel runs a lovely programme of autumn events – produce shows, antiques fairs and an arts day around the town – and the Bodmin & Wenford Railway puts on cream tea trains and galas all through September.
Stargazing
And finally, one of the bonuses of earlier sunsets is stargazing at a more reasonable hour. In midsummer you have to stay up super late for it to get dark enough – but with sunsets between 7-8pm, you can marvel at the Milky Way and get a full night’s sleep before another full day of exploring.
Bodmin Moor was designated an International Dark Sky Landscape back in 2017, the first protected landscape in the country to manage it, and it’s about half an hour up the road. Head up to the Hurlers stone circle at Minions Heritage Centre and look up. Standing among Bronze Age stones under that sky is a genuinely strange and lovely feeling.
And if you don’t fancy leaving the farm, there are tons of excellent stargazing spots at Old Lanwarnick. Enjoy the dark skies from your private hot tub (if you’re staying in Hob Nob or The Old Farmhouse) or book a spot in the hot tub barn – its open sides are perfect for stargazing. Book the pavilion for an evening picnic under the night sky. Or if you’re in one of our glamping pods, light a campfire, lean back, and soak in the stars.
So, you’ve heard it from us – September rules. Bring the dog, pack your Tupperware, and come and enjoy the best of Cornwall while everyone else is back at work.
