One day I was always going to have to eat quinoa. It might as well be now

As a rule, I tend not to frequent places where there is a sign on the door saying ‘no sharps’. But I thought I would make an exception for the Eden Project. Surely, I thought, as we walked from the ‘Banana’ car park to the ticket office, they must mean sharps as in penknives, or something. The number of people in the queue wearing sandals made from reconstituted tyre rubber was a further warning sign but I chose to ignore it.

As we stood amid the rainbow-striped cardigan-wearing clientele and their brightly dyed hairstyles, the builder had a look on his face that said: ‘I think we’ve wandered into the wrong sort of place for us.’

My parents insisted on buying the tickets. When they came back from the counter my mother had a pinched look on her face. The damage, with a guide book, was £100.

‘This greenhouse had better be good,’ I said. ‘It’s just a load of hippies,’ muttered the builder, looking like he was about to explode into full white van man mode at any moment.

Things did not get better when we decided to have a spot of lunch in the canteen. After foraging through a display of organic brown cardboard salad boxes, my mum and dad ended up with a form of pâté, mercifully, but there was nothing left for me save a quinoa mulch. Fine, I thought, I’m going to have to eat quinoa at some stage, so it might as well be now.

The builder had a beef and potato pasty. He’s going to turn into a pasty before we leave Cornwall. With scones for afters, the bill came to nearly £50. The builder squeaked but I kicked him to stay quiet.

Then, as we ate our strange luncheon, we noticed there was an equally strange puppet show going on beside us.