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Gigs gather for first Fal festival

By Colin Gregory
Traditional pilot cutters and gigs will be gathering over the next few days for the first Fal River Festival, which begins on Saturday.
The festival will be celebrating the rich diversity of life around a busy and beautiful estuary that figures large in the life of towns, villages and communities around it.
Food and drink, literature, music and art and much more will be celebrate over the next two weeks, and one of the most interesting gatherings will be of traditional pilot cutters and pilot gigs to celebrate the Falmouth pilot trade.
There will be opportunities for individuals or groups all week to take part in sailing and rowing events in St Mawes bay and throughout the Fal with a “get the pilot aboard” theme. The festival will raise awareness of the role that St Mawes harbour, Carrick Roads, Falmouth and the River Fal.
James Wharram. The famous explorer and sailor, will lead a session at Glad(e)06 on Ancient Polynesian Navigation and exhibit one of his boat designs, the Tikopia. This boat is designed to give the people of the tiny Pacific Island of Tikopia their own independent sea transport.
James will join a team of internationally acclaimed speakers, including Satish Kumar of Schumacher College, Chris Hines of the Eden Project and Pip Richards of the Sustainable Trust, at Trelissick Gardens next Thursday.
In addition to the speakers’ sessions there will be opportunity to take part in the largest environmental sculpture ever attempted in Cornwall.
More details of this fascinating festival are contained in our Freetime Supplement.