The Helford River – stealing the limelight

Set in 65 acres of sub-tropical garden, woodland and golf course, Budock Vean is sat, tucked away, on The Helford River on the south coast of Cornwall … infact, it’s the only hotel on The Helford.  The river’s tranquil waters, creeks and hamlets have long provided inspiration for artists including writers such as Daphne Du Maurier whose famous Frenchman’s Creek is just opposite the hotel’s private foreshore, ready to be explored by foot, boat, kayak or SUP.

Over the years there have been many film and TV crews in and around the hotel; out and on the Helford or resting up after filming in Cornwall. The Helford area has become a bit of a star in it’s own right with many adaptations of Rosamunde Pilcher’s tales filmed around and about.

But it’s not just Pilcher that has had her work filmed in this area, The Helford has been connected to the glamour of the silver screen – both big and small.

The stunning scenery and mild climate has meant the whole of Cornwall has a very long list of movie credits ranging from classics like Ladies in Lavender and Fishermen’s Friends to the zombie film World War Z that was partly filmed in Falmouth harbour.

In August 1877 Robert Louis Stevenson visited Cornwall with his parents. It was this visit, and some of the old seadogs he observed, that is said to have inspired him to write his 1883 adventure novel ‘Treasure Island’.

In 1950 this book was turned into a big budget Walt Disney film, starring Robert Newton as Long John Silver, and most of the exterior shots were filmed in Cornwall, on the calm waters in and around the River Fal and Helford River.

There have been two major adaptations of Daphne du Maurier’s Frenchman’s Creek including the 1998 TV film production with Tara Fitzgerald as Dona and Anthony Delon as the pirate captain and using the Helford and Frenchman’s Creek as locations. The press described the film as “a treat for Helford fans” and a “must for all Daphne du Maurier fans”.

Away from big budget, big scene movies the Helford River has also featured in numerous TV programmes, the star of shows covering subjects as diverse as archaeology and cooking.

In 2010 the actor Timothy Spall, famed for his role in the Harry Potter films, and his wife sailed from Cornwall to South Wales in an old Dutch barge, the Princess Matilda, for the BBC series, The Call of the Sea.  In the first episode after making their way down the Cornish coast the couple visit Falmouth and then moor up in the Helford to escape some bad weather. Trapped for some time by adverse winds they end up enjoying the fun and frolics of the Helford Regatta, which is held on the river each summer.

The wonderful series, Time Team, made a programme investigating a pair of ancient earthworks in fields above the Helford in the 9^th series of this ever-popular archaeology programme. In the episode, filmed in 2002 at Gear and Caer Vallack, Tony Robinson and the team revealed the remains of an Iron Age market that would once have been one of the most important trading sites in the area. Finds included pottery and coins dating back some 2000 years.

Of course, the Helford has also attracted its fair share of foodies.

The classic TV show Floyd on Fish came to Cornwall in 1985. The larger-than-life host, Keith Floyd, one of the very first celebrity chefs, visited the fish market at Newlyn, where he selected a variety of fish to make his bouillabaisse. He then pops over to the Helford River and the Duchy of Cornwall Oyster Farm near Port Navas, where he talks to Len Hodges, whose family have been gathering oysters from the river for generations.

Oysters are just one of the tasty treasures from the river and the surrounding countryside, its other culinary delights were the focus of another more recent cooking show – The Hungry Sailors with Dick and James Strawbridge. On the Cornish leg of the journey there is some serious pasty making of course and the pair also find themselves by the Helford River foraging for mushrooms and fungi.

Their delight in the produce that the Cornish countryside can produce is echoed every day by our own chefs here at Budock Vean, who source so much of our menu locally.

In 2021 the former politician and railway enthusiast, Micheal Portillo, visited the Helford while making his programme, Devon and Cornwall Walks. He spoke to (me) Cornish writer Elizabeth Dale about the secret missions of the French Resistance and British Special Operations Executive to the coast of Brittany from the quiet waters of the river during World War Two, as well as the troops that left from here as part of the infamous D-Day landings.

And just last year Rick Stein and his film crew took to the hotel’s boat to film out on the River, and who can blame them, it really is a wonderful spot.

When not filming directly on our patch, the hotel often welcomes cast and crew.  Nearly 10 years ago, in July 2015, a star-studded group of actors and a film crew descended Cornwall to film ‘And then there were None’, an new adaptation of Agatha Christie’s famous 1939 novel filmed on location at nearby Mullion Island, Mullion Cove and Kynance Cove.  Over the course of that summer many of the cast, which included Anna Maxwell Martin, Sam Neill, Miranda Richardson, Toby Stephens and Aiden Turner, as well as the crew, took their r&r here at Budock Vean.

Whether it is writers, artists, documentary makers or movie stars, or just those paddling the waters or walking along its banks of the Helford, this place has a way of getting under your skin.