Country diary: no miners emerge from the dark to break the peace today

Luckett, Tamar Valley: Vegetation hides the extensive spoil heaps and the midday sun gilds catkins on sprawling hazels

On the north side of Kit Hill, remnants of last night's hail lie beside the steep road leading to the old mining settlement of Luckett. A solitary stack in a field above Deer Park Farm used to vent poisonous arsenic fumes from works in the valley below; down there, beside abandoned mine workings, dilapidated single-storey dwellings have been mooted as a mining museum.