IT was advertised as ‘the best day of the week’. Now it seems Flambards has reached its last ever day of the week.

The famous tourist attraction near Helston in West Cornwall announced last week that it was closing with immediate effect.

Defeated, it seems, by the rising cost of everything and a dwindling number of visitors.

It’s the latest casualty on an increasingly long list of businesses unable to survive, and I fear it won’t be the last.

Everyday we hear stories of pubs, cafes and shops closing because they can no longer afford the bills, but for me the loss of Flambards is a watershed moment.

I can’t say I was a regular visitor to Flambards in recent years, for a start it is at the other end of the county from where I now live. But as a child I did visit a few times.

To outsiders it may have seemed a bit of a quaint tourist attraction, but for those of us growing up in Cornwall in the 1970s, Flambards was our Disney World.

In its heyday it really did live up to its billing as ‘the best day of the week’. There really was nothing else quite like it in that part of Cornwall at the time.

I felt the same about the Carn Brea leisure centre near Redruth.

In Truro, where I lived, we only had a very basic pool with one diving board.

When the Carn Brea leisure centre opened it was like venturing onto the set of a James Bond film, at least it was for me at the age of seven! I seem to remember that the pool had a very fancy water slide; it all felt very futuristic at the time.

We were easily pleased back then!

It was the same with Flambards. It was a quirky mix of modern rides and Victorian streets. I can also remember that sections of it were devoted to the First and Second World Wars and different types of aircraft.

It sounds very old fashioned now, but we didn’t have much else to compare it to back then.

I am not sure how much it has moved with the times, but I suspect youngsters have much higher expectations today and the cost of updating everything regularly was possibly part of its downfall.

The loss of Flambards is a big blow to the tourism industry in Cornwall, but what is even more worrying is the fact that it isn’t the only attraction in the county closing its doors.

Dairyland near Newquay has also shut for the final time blaming financial losses and the increase in operating costs.

And on the Devon Cornwall border Dingles Fairground Museum has also just closed down. The escalating running costs and lingering impact of the pandemic were the final straw.

I feel very sorry for the lovely team at Dingles. They were a passionate and dedicated group.

I spent a very enjoyable day and a very long night at Dingles when they hosted us for the BBC Children in Need outside broadcast one year.

It was a great location with the colourful and noisy fairground rides providing the perfect backdrop to our fundraising broadcast.

So, in the space of a few days, three long-standing tourist attractions have closed. To lose one is unfortunate, to lose three suggests a very worrying trend.

It also comes after recent concern from tourism leaders that visitor numbers were disappointing this year; hence my fear that we could see more closures.

And as if that wasn’t enough, there’s now an additional cost for businesses after the rise in employers’ national insurance announced in the recent budget.

At the moment I am struggling to see how that measure will stimulate the much-needed growth the government keeps talking about.

Whether we like it or not, tourism is our lifeblood in this region and if it’s unable to thrive the knock on effect will be felt by thousands of other small businesses and individuals.

But if you ventured out to some of our tourist hotspots this summer, you may be wondering why so many businesses are struggling.

My sister and her family came home to Cornwall for a holiday this summer. One day in August we decided to meet up and cycle the Camel Trail from Wadebridge to Padstow.

It was an expensive day! With coffee, lunch, bike hire, ice creams and parking I calculated that the day cost our group of five people more than three hundred pounds. That’s three hundred pounds for just one family day out in Cornwall.

Forget the slogan ‘the best day of the week’; it’s rapidly becoming ‘the costliest day of the week’.

I asked my sister how it compared to prices in Canada where she lives. She said the cost of eating out here in the UK is far higher.

I don’t blame the businesses. In most cases they are simply passing on their costs, and it’s clear from the recent failures that many are still not making enough to survive.

Sadly I think there is now a bit of vicious circle going on. The cost of doing business is getting higher and higher, but the more those businesses put up their prices, the less willing or able the rest of us are to spend, or to holiday in areas such as the South West.

It’s often cheaper for families to go on an all-inclusive holiday abroad with guaranteed good weather and all the food and drink included in the price.

I don’t know what the answer is. It feels like we are all paying a huge and ever-growing price for goods and services, but it’s never enough.

In the meantime I am thinking of those who have lost their jobs with the recent closure of tourist attractions and those who have worked so hard to build up businesses and have had to make the heart-breaking decision to close them.

I will also cherish my memories of Flambards. Thank you for some of the best childhood days of the week!

Bye for now.