A Warm Welcome

Fearsome weather fails to dent the enthusiasm at the Tetcott, as the next generation discover the joys of the sport

- Rebecca Jordan

SWEEPING round the last bend into Marhamchurch just over the Devon/Cornwall border, late autumnal sun glinted off the sea, highlighting Bude’s coastal haven. But dark clouds were closing in. A black scree brought down the curtain on any theatre further out to sea.

Exposed atop a Cornish bank, a lonely hawthorn, bent double from years of weathering southwesterly gales, started to quiver. It wouldn’t be long before we were lashed with the same force battering the Atlantic just three miles away.

The timing was appalling. It was half-term and this was the Tetcott’s newcomers’ meet. Twenty children far outnumbered adults gathered with hounds in a field on the edge of the village. Junior dominance is de facto here.

Raindrops turned to stair rods. Our backs were soaked in seconds as horses and ponies swung freshly-clipped quarters into the weather. Hounds that, moments before, had weaved through the pack to look up expectantly and with impatience at their huntsman, Tom Phillips, sat on their haunches tight under the hedge, water streaming down their ears.

None of this had the slightest impact on Steve Youldon. His enthusiasm is infectious; his kind nature knows no boundaries. Nor does the size of the measure he pours. A quadruple Grouse at 9am didn’t do my note-taking any favours.

Steve’s son Andrew joined the mastership this season. He works as a linesman for Western Power so has an intimate knowledge of this countryside. This pays dividends when it comes to opening up country.

“I am obsessed with hunting but since joining the mastership my overriding concern is other people enjoying their day — that and that the farmers are happy,” said Andrew.