Welcome to today’s show!
Today I talk briefly about an awesome touring park I stayed at. Then I talk about a few great sites that are easy to visit, and in beautiful locations in Devon.
This includes Langstone Rock, Jacobs Ladder, and Byes Riverside Park.
Links to my content:
Social: @drivinghorizons
The transcript below is auto-generated, so apologies if it reads strangely!
It is Friday, the 11th of February, this is episode 38 from welcome back to driving Horizon’s. And low, hello, hello and a good morning, a good afternoon and a good evening to whenever or wherever you are listening to this.
Richard here, welcome back to the podcast. If you are new here, then welcome. And if you aren’t a regular, then of course, welcome back. So it’s been a busy week, mainly in the office this week. I’ve been doing lots of editing to get some videos out.
Last week show you may have heard me talk about the motor home and camper van show or the now set motor home camping show I went to. So I’m not going to talk about that this week. You can find all about that in last week’s episode, but what I am going to talk about this week is some
of the amazing things that I did while I was down in that part of the world. So the motorhome and camper van show was in West Point in Exeter and I stayed down there. I saw some sites around Exeter and a couple of places on the way back, so stay with me to hear about the suggestions I’ve
got for the area and the great places that we were that I visited when I was down there. I spotted a couple of things this week in a magazine that I wanted to and I wanted to share with you.
I picked up a copy of the Practical Motorhome magazine, which talks about much of homes and camper vans and things like that. I don’t think it really touches too much on on caravans, but on one of their pages, they were talking about the site winners that are judged and awarded by the AA.
And one of the campsites that they have awarded Campsite of the Year to for Wales is one that we visited a couple of years ago. And just by chance, because I put this video out long before I saw this magazine, I recommended this campsite for one that we would definitely revisit in 2022.
So it looks like the AA have good taste because if I can recommend it, then obviously it’s good enough for them as well. And the other thing I saw in there was something called night stops. Now night stops is I don’t know if anyone’s familiar too much with Harvest’s hosts that they have in in America is basically
businesses, you know, things like wineries, breweries, places that have lots of land where you are allowed to register and all these caravans, motorhomes, whatever they want to call them over there can park for free. But they are expected, I guess, is the word to use the services of the venue at your park here.
So if you’re staying at a winery, a winery, have a wine tasting or by a couple of bottles of wine, if you are staying at a brewery, maybe have dinner there or try out some of the bears is kind of a Win-Win situation because the Tories can park for free and the businesses get people there to spend
money and they’re buying their goods and services and just giving up space that would otherwise be sat idle when empty. So they’re placing this thing in the UK is called night stops and I’ve only ever seen in the last couple of months and we have something around Europe corporate stocks, which is quiet, which is quite similar, but
this just looks a little bit less. You know, you don’t have to sign up for anything you don’t have to pay to join it. I don’t think I’m going to a little bit more investigation on it, but there are at the moment 34 places around the country, which doesn’t sound a lot, but they are, well spread out
. I can’t see any way on this one in Wales. I’m sorry, I can’t see any in Scotland, but there is one in Scotland that is up quite in the north of Scotland. But there’s like 34 of them around the country and they all do like their pubs or inns or hotels, places like that where you can, I
believe, just stop and park up and camp for the night. And you know, you’ll be expected to have dinner in that pub or buy a few drinks or, you know, just show your appreciation by you can have to have dinner anyway or have a drink anyway.
Maybe it just means that you win because you can park up and they win because they get businesses they probably wouldn’t normally go. So that’s the other thing I wanted to mention before I rest a lot about what I did in Exeter.
I would try and do a little spot at the start of the show on things I’ve seen or news I might have that perhaps the listeners here wouldn’t have heard about that. I’d buy the magazines or that I read the magazines I see these in, and if I see anything on Twitter and things like that.
So I just sort of bookmark things I like to share a couple every week. So I’m not going to take up loads of time on it. But there’s a two that I’ve I’ve seen for this week, so I’m sitting back in my chair.
I’ve got no notes in front of me. I do have my computer with some pictures on. I may be thinking looking at two for memory, but. Let me tell you about what I did while I was in Exeter, so I it was about a three hour drive and I went to the show first, but then I headed
over to a campsite called Coughed and Holidays. Now it does everything. It’s got more intense lodges, caravans, holiday cottages. You know, it has all sorts of accommodation. It’s a proper holiday park. So if you want somewhere private and secluded and quiet, do not go to often holidays.
However, that’s actually for sure. There are pictures in there, but where it would be, but there will be height of summer. It will be busy. It wasn’t even when I was there, it was quite busy there. A lot of pictures taken around me.
But if you want somewhere with a swimming pool, if you want somewhere with indoor and outdoor, by the way, with a bowling alley, with a pool, you know, like the snooker pool, that type of pool and an arcade, I think they’ve got there.
There was a pub, a bar and arrests and a separate cafe there. They had a play park, they had a laundromat, they had a lake for fishing. They had a go. If you don’t know what go APIs is where they put ropes and climbing things through to trees.
In a word where the kids were not just kids, I guess can go up and climb along and climb down the trees and balance and tight rope, and it’s all safe and harnessed and things like that. They got in.
But one of those there is a dog walk in park, as well as the usual facilities you would expect in terms of our sand points from washing. The showers were good. It is a really, really good family park for a really good holiday park, particularly for families.
So if you are looking for somewhere in Devon and you want somewhere, that’s a little bit livelier with things to do in the evening or more places to drink or places to eat or something for the kids, do in particular, check out coffin holidays.
There is a review of it over on my YouTube channel, and I’ll give you the details for that at the end of the today’s episode. But yes, that’s why I stayed just for one night and I visited 33 main places I visited.
Exeter, Dawlish, Warren and a place called Limestone Rock, I visited a place called Jacob when stopped off to key, I visited Jacob’s Ladder and I also stopped it by his Riverside Park. Now, the first thing I did when I left the campsite was I drove into Dawlish Warren, which is just a ten minute drive away.
There’s a real big carpark there, and it’s not very expensive. Let me see if I can find let me see how good Google timeline is. Saturday, the 30th. Uh, that that that that night or Saturday and 30th Sunday, 30th Saturday, the 29th.
Let’s zoom into. Here we go. Well, after all, that is just called Dawlish Warren Car Park, Big Car Park used to be able to come there, but you can’t now. And they’ve stopped camping there, unfortunately, which is a shame.
But it’s a short walk to the South West Coast path, and once you’re on that path, if you head right, so as you get to the path, as you approach the path through the sea in front of you, you want to go west, which would be right.
As if you’re heading towards Cornwall along the coast, ten minutes less than five minutes down the line, you come to a place called Lang Stone Rock, which is quite a spectacular rock that sticks out onto the beach. And I think at low tide you might be able to walk around there, but anything above low tide and you
can. Or they don’t quote me on that because when I was there, you couldn’t walk around it. But it’s just beautiful. It looks like it’s from Mars. You know, it’s bright orange rock. It was just against the blue sky.
It was stunning. And if this wasn’t a podcast, I would show you pictures of this bar is coming up in this Sunday’s video, hopefully, but it’s taken me a long time to edit, but it should be done in time.
But it’s really photogenic. Great place to have a walk around. So that’s the first thing I did, and I had it back along the coast towards Dawlish, the back of the way I came and had a little quick wander around Dawlish Warren, a small or seaside area with cafes and amusements and things like that.
It was a go kart track near as a beach there, which looks quite attractive. I didn’t spend too much time there because I wanted to crack on, but as you know, be a nice place to spend a few hours and have lunch, maybe.
And I would definitely recommend that part of Exeter to have a look at limestone rock because it is really, really beautiful, especially when the sun is shining and this vibrant sort of golden red rock standing out against the blue skies is a beautiful place.
And as the day was amazing for January, like 13 or 14 degrees. So I really did luck out on that on that trip, but I had a long journey ahead of me and some other things to see. So I left Dawlish, Warren and I headed up the coast to the Key West.
Stops had a quick look around the key stop for lunch in a pub called Let’s hope this is in here Exeter Quay. Let’s go to the pub was called QT. Isn’t this always the way this Google timeline, which I am kind of testing, is very vague.
It just gives me long, straight lines, diagonal everywhere. And so that’s why I joined. I parked. I stopped at a pub in, is it obvious I don’t plan these podcasts because it should be because I don’t. Let’s have a quick look.
It’s a key. I’m sure it’ll be on him anywhere. He’s just got a, uh, there’s the potato crossed. I walked along there, the prospect in there we go. The prospects in. There was a brewery called the top sham.
I think it’s called Topsham Brewery, Topsham Brewery and taproom. But they didn’t do food. I think so. I didn’t go in there because I wanted something to eat. At the same time, I was going to be there for half an hour.
So I went across the river to the river across into the prospect in fishing sandwich, usual pub stuff and a a quick drink. And I had a walk around the key. There’s a little bars and restaurants and cafes and things.
There’s quite nice bridge to walk over called the Crystal Pitt Bridge, and there’s plenty of little shops in that that you could have a wander around. I managed to get free parking on a road called I think it was Maritime Court managed to squeeze on there where you can wait for a couple of hours at weekends, I
think. And so that was nice. It was stop off on the way back through because I’m now heading east to go back through Dorset into Hampshire. And then I stopped about an hour later. I think it was I got to a place called Jacob’s Ladder, which is on the south coast, on the coast again, right on the
beach. It’s a big white ladder. It’s a clock tower with a ladder or steps going down onto the beach. I’ve got let me have a quick look. There we go. I’ve got it. Here I can read you the clock tower, Jacob’s ladder.
So here we go. Historic Sebelius’s This was in the pseudo castle with clock tower was built in the 19th century as the boathouse for a nearby Clifton Cliff Cottage. Boats were lifted up and lower down using Davis. Previously, there was an 18th century lime kiln.
Here, the stone was shipped to the beach and brought up by donkeys, using a path cut into the cliffs. And then it goes on to talk about how it got eroded and the steps were cut into the cliff.
They too eroded and were replaced in 1871 by state wooden ladder, which is the first Jacob’s Ladder. But that didn’t prove very popular, and this was replaced by a staircase over time where the damage required further replacements and it was eventually dismantled and removed during World War two.
But if you go there, what you can find is some metal steps going down to the beach and also some concrete steps built into the front of the cottage or the clock tower. And I walked up both. You’ll see that in the video that’s coming up this week.
I parked in a place if you are interested because it is a really, really big car park. The car park was called an Irish plan. It’s a little bit more Manor Road, long stay car park and massive car park.
But they do the paying a little bit way to look out for this. If you are going to stay there, basically what they do is you have to you put in the you’ve arrived into the app and that’s it runs and runs and runs.
You don’t book for two hours or three hours. He just runs. You have to remember to stop it when you leave. So if you don’t, it will just run and run and run for the maximum time. So if you’re only there an hour and you drive off and leave it for three or four hours, you’ll get charged
for three or four hours, I assume. I suppose you could contested what’s the risk? Excuse me, quick slurp of coffee. And so be careful of that. You have to register your time when your arrival and then remember to stop it as you leave, and that’s what you get charged for.
I kind of like it because it means I don’t go out on three hours. Union up staying for two. You’ve wasted an hour. But this way you just pay for use as long as you can remember to stop it.
So then was time I was getting on. Now I think it was about 4:00 by this point, and I still had about a two hour drive to get home. And I was thinking to myself, Should I stop anywhere else?
And I thought, Yes, I am going to stop somewhere else. I am going to stop. A little garden near is called by Riverside Park, and I will tell you where that is because it wasn’t far away. It was only, I think, about 20 minutes away, less than that actually, and ten minutes away from from Manor Road long
stay car park. And there’s a place like cycled by Riverside Park. I was desperate to see a waterfall. I googled everywhere and in Devon. See a waterfall. And am I the ones I could find with? Too far into devel or into one of the national parks there.
But on the way back, I found what was a it. It’s really a waterfall. It’s all I could wear, but it was flowing water and it was nice to see a few photos, a bit of video there. It was by a place called BI’s Fort.
I think it’s called BI’s Mill Street Sidmouth, and it was by a place called as the River Sits, a guy that buys toll house and gates and is a small toll house on the bridge. So I guess in the old days, you had to pay to cross the bridge.
These days you don’t or I didn’t, and it’s on the river. Since I parked on a Salcombe Road, there’s a few spaces where you can stop at for an hour. I got lucky again managed just to squeeze a camper van in at the end of one of the lanes there.
five minute walk back to the river and it was a nice thing to see in the photograph. So maybe a little bit of a hidden gem, according to how I found it now, probably on TripAdvisor say it’s probably not that much of a hidden gem, but it’s not the sort of place you’d earmark to visit.
But it’s certainly a good place to stop and have a look at if you are if you are passing because it’s just a piece for gardens with a nice, you know, the sound of running water, and that is kind of quite peaceful.
And so it was a good end to the weekend. So for places that I can, I can recommend Dawlish, Warren and particularly limestone rock. Again, these are none of these are massive. You could do that in half an hour and stay for lunch or something.
Have a wander around Exeter, a Jacob’s Ladder, which is near Sidmouth. And you know, again, you could just spend half an hour to an hour there all day if you wanted to sit on the beach. There’s a massive car park, you know, probably get busy weekends and in the good weather and stuff and is Riverside Park, which
is just a real quick stop off to if you’ve got a hankering to view some waterfalls and. So that’s it, really, that is what I’m going to talk about today is 20 minutes nearly well, I hope you enjoyed that showed you some sights and sounds.
Not too many sounds, but some sites there of of. Exeter and a little bit of sorry, they have Exeter and and various different places in Devon, and I just want to read our I had another podcast to come which podcast it was now that that gave out travel quotes at the end of it.
And I don’t and I’m not going to buy just for one today the. Really sort of stuck with me. And it really sort of made me think and appreciate what I’m trying to do and how I’m trying to do it and how important some things are.
And the quote went something like this, and I can’t remember who said it. I’m really sorry. I think it was a I don’t even think that was credited to anyone who popped up on a picture on Facebook, and it said something like this simply travel.
You can get your money back. You cannot get your time back. And that really sort of resonated with me. And as much as anything could happen, you know? And why? Why wait till tomorrow or till you retire or tell you you have the time because you know, anything could happen?
And so use the time how you want to use it. People may just be happy when you’re doing it anyway. I’m going to leave it there for now. So a couple of things I want to remind you. My website is driving Horizon’s dot com head over there.
There’s a blog post reviews, travel stories, camp site reviews, things like that. And of course, there is also my YouTube channel, which is driving horizons dot com forward slash YouTube that will take you through to straight to YouTube and straight to my videos.
I’ve been really lucky the subscribers have been going up a lot in the last few weeks. So I’m just under 700 now at the time of writing this, or what time of recording this. So head over there and subscribe.
It’s a real good way to support me and also what I’m trying to do here. And also, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast and please do leave me a review because if there’s anything I can change to make it better than I will otherwise, I’m just going to keep on rambling.
But that’s my ramble is over for today. So thank you very, very much for staying. Stick it out till the end. I will see you in next Friday’s show podcast. And until then, have a great week and happy travels.