I’m excited to share with you that I crossed an item off of my Jane Austen bucket list on July 14. I went to The Cobb (a breakwater) in Lyme Regis–the site of a scene from Austen’s novel, Persuasion. Before I tell you about this scene, please watch this montage of scenes from various adaptations.
This is the Louisa-Musgrove-jumps-off-The-Cobb scene! As Austen puts it, “The young people were all wild to see Lyme.” Guess I’m not that old, then!
For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, Louisa and a bunch of characters have traveled from Bath to the coastal town of Lyme Regis to see some people, and they are out walking near/on this human-made rock seawall when Louisa shows her immaturity by jumping off the seawall into Captain Wentworth’s arms. The first time she does this he catches her, but like a child who gets too excited she decides to jump a second time and does so before Wentworth is ready.
Guess what happens next. If you watched the video you know, but if not, here’s what happens: She falls and hits her head. She is knocked unconscious and takes a while to recover from her concussion. Let this be a warning to you: don’t pull a Louisa.
You really should read Austen’s words from chapter 12.
I have wanted to visit this spot for almost a decade. Reading about it in Austen’s novel is one thing, but watching the Louisa faceplant scenes in adaptations just made me want to visit all the more. I decided this year would be the year I visited the site where Louisa pulled a Humpty-Dumpty.
On July 14 we left Southampton for Lyme Regis. To get there you have to take a train from Southampton to Salisbury to get to another small town (Axminster). Then, you have to get on a bus (the Jurassic Coaster) to Lyme Regis. Due to some train mishaps (two of the trains to Axminster were canceled; we missed the bus by 10 seconds and had to wait an hour) we thought we’d never get there! But we made it, only to find GPS made us walk out of our way with our luggage to get to our flat. Yup, we AirBnB’d it again!
We arrived at the apartment I was most excited about–a cute two-level cottage (actually three, but we had the top two floors). It’s called Moggy’s Place and it’s adorable.
After we checked in and dropped off our luggage, we decided to walk down into the town and look for The Cobb.
We were hungry, so we ate dinner at this lovely pub called The Cobb Arms. I had the steak and ale pie with chips and veggies, and it was so good. I enjoyed it so much I had it a second night with mashed potatoes!
Then it was time to do what I came here to do: recreate a scene from Persuasion!
Let me tell you this: it is windy on The Cobb. You can see and hear it in this video.
Here are some pics:
Those pics show the view from the top. Now check out the pics of Kensington climbing the main stairs. Oh, I climbed them too!
When in Rome, er, Lyme Regis, you have to do what the Austen characters do, right? So I pulled a Louisa. This was my destiny.
Luckily, I didn’t suffer a concussion. I jumped right up and went to the other end of The Cobb.
Here are the steps at the opposite part of The Cobb called Granny’s Teeth. Steep! Dangerous!
When I decided to descend from the top level at that end of the breakwater I didn’t realize that the water could cascade over The Cobb, thus drenching me. Oops. Glad I had on a raincoat and quick drying pants.
We also got to walk over to the beach and see the small, colorful huts. It’s amazing to me that you can rent these!
It wasn’t easy to get to Lyme Regis without a car, but we made it! And from the moment we arrived we loved it!
The next morning we would fulfill our secondary reason for visiting Lyme Regis: visiting the Lyme Regis Museum to learn more about pre-historic fossils and engage in our own fossil hunting as if we were Mary Anning! I know you’ll enjoy the next blog post!
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Misty Krueger 
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