|
Back
to Tara's page
From
The Sunday Times
14 June 2009
My hols: Tara Fitzgerald
The actress was
captivated by Vietnam, but it’s Cornwall that has stolen her heart
 Like
a lot of people in this country, I have an almost umbilical connection to
Cornwall — it seems to be where a lot of us went for our first
bucket-and-spade holiday. I have a place that I go to in Penzance, and
that’s where I intend to spend most of my holidays from now on. I love the
land: there’s something mystical and powerful about it. And I like being
that far down — it’s just that little bit too far, in a way. You only go
there with serious intent. But it has some of the most spectacular beaches,
such as Porthcurno, which has the most extraordinary colour water, even
more beautiful than the Mediterranean.
As
a kid, I used to go to Fowey, in the south — Daphne du Maurier country.
It’s full of picture-book white cottages and narrow lanes. We stayed in a
cottage with a garden, with steps down to a boat, and I have a picture that
my mum’s taken of me and my sister, rowing. We have oars in our hands, and
the boat’s the wrong way round. We didn’t make much progress, but that
wasn’t the point, really.
I
lived in the Bahamas until I was three years old. My grandfather set up a
practice there as a lawyer, in Freeport, and my mother and her sisters
joined him. I was very little, but it does stick in the mind: I remember
the heat, and the walk down to the sand from the condo, and the sound of
cicadas.
One
of my first big trips, when I was about 17, was InterRailing — France,
Italy, Turkey, Greece. We did that brilliant thing: jumping on a train,
wrapping our bags round our ankles, sleeping on the couchettes, and seeing
where we turned up.
My
best friend and I were really more concerned about how we looked than about
packing light. We could barely move: we were like donkeys careering down
the streets. I enjoyed the journeys as much as the destinations. One of my
fondest memories is of being on the train for a very long time, and not
having any seats. So we sat out in the corridor and looked out at Cannes
and Nice — just beautiful. I arrived with my face covered in soot from
sticking my head out of the window.
We
never really got into any trouble, but I did have to phone my mum and get
her to sell a fridge. I was in financial difficulties and we had a spare.
I’m not proud of it: she only got about £60 for it, but it was enough that
she could then wire the money out to us. We had to go to a phone exchange
and wait to hear if anything had come through. It all just upped the sense
of adventure, I suppose.
I
got that sense of drama again when I went to Vietnam a couple of years ago.
It had that essence of being really away. Richard and I went to Ho Chi Minh
City, Hanoi and an island called Phu Quoc. All the guidebooks said that
crossing the road takes some getting used to, and it’s only when you get
there that you see what they’re talking about. What used to be bicycles in
all those classic pictures have now been replaced by mopeds, so you have
the same quantity of people, just going faster. There’s a faith system when
you cross the road as a pedestrian. You just walk, and you believe that
people will go around you. And it’s an amazing thing, because they do. The
key is not to break your rhythm.
It’s
quite a fast sort of place, in contrast to Bangkok, which was much softer.
But it’s quite visceral. It hasn’t been destroyed by too much occupation:
there’s evidence of America, and of France, obviously, as they speak
French, but there’s still a lot that’s its own.
Travel,
for me, is about reduction. It’s hard to find simple any more. There’s this
myth that we’re somehow better off because of all the choice and luxury,
but you don’t need all that. It’s why people pay a lot of money just to sit
on a bare floor. And often, all these posh resorts are doing is simulating
nature, when, for a lot less, you can go out and get it for real. There’s
nothing more beautiful than walking down an empty beach in Cornwall at
sunset. I’d choose that over five-star luxury every time. But then I’ve
never felt comfortable with too much luxury — you have to look a certain
way to pull it off. I never have. I’m a bit too “chipped-nail-polish girl”.
Tara
Fitzgerald talked to Paul Croughton
This site was created and is
maintained by John Robinson © 1995
|
