A FORMER manager of Swindon town centre has shed her high heels for walking boots and is now piloting fresh air around the Land's End peninsula.

Donnette Pearce was the first marketing professional employed to promote the town as a great place in which to shop. Then in 1998 she moved to a similar job at the Great Western Designer Outlet Village.

Now she and Ed Bufton, a former solicitor, have set up Laidback Trailblazers in a tiny hamlet four miles from Penzance and are offering short but active breaks for people who want to get away from the daily grind.

One of the first things they did was set the seal on their personal as well as their business partnership by getting married.

"We married at a register office in our walking boots, and then celebrated with pasties and champagne at the local pub," said the 53-year-old mother of four.

They met in Midsomer Norton where Ed was a partner in a law firm and Donnette once ran her own health studio.

They have bought a converted barn which has enough room for themselves and six guests. Ed also has two holiday cottages at nearby Newlyn.

The couple aim to provide their holidaymakers with good food as well as good exercise.

They are in an area which has plenty of first class places to eat including one restaurant run by fish expert and gourmet chef Rick Stein and another owned by Jean Shrimpton, a supermodel in the 1960s.

"We emphasise the laid-back part of our business name," said Donnette. "We aren't into route marches."

She left Swindon in 1999 to launch a customer research firm.

"I missed the town. I still think it's a great place," she said.

"And I remember lots of Swindon people telling me how much they liked Cornwall, so we hope to see some of them walking around the Land's End peninsula.

"We had both been coming down here for many years to walk, so we know it very well and felt we wanted to share that knowledge with other people."

Their converted barn has moorland at its back and is close to the county's wild Atlantic coast with its multitude of paths.

"We can tailor breaks to individual tastes. This is a great place for bird spotters and we can also arrange surfing, horse riding, cycling and golf."

The Buftons can be reached at their website www.laidback-trails.co.uk.