South Devon

In short, Devon is a county located in the Southwest of England and lies between Cornwall and Somerset; it also has a short border with Dorset in the southeast. Devon has an area of 6,707 square kilometres and has a population of a bit more than one million people. Interesting fact – Devon is slightly bigger than the State of Palestine and is more than 20 times bigger than the smallest EU member state Malta.

The biggest city is Exeter, however, Devon is very well known because of its seaside towns located on the English Channel coast. During the summer, many holidaymakers go to such nice and popular places as Torquay and Dartmouth.  However, we decided to head even more to the south of Devon and visited Bigbury on Sea and Hope Cove during a weekend in September. Both Bigbury on Sea (located not far from Plymouth) and Hope Cove are located in the South Hams district.

Getting there

The fastest way to get there (assuming that you come from a place located more to the north) is to drive to Exeter using M5 and continue southwest on A38 or A380 from there. At some point, you will have to turn to one of the smaller roads which are quite narrow and you may feel happy if you can drive 40 miles per hour – in many cases that is the maximum speed you can afford.

Very often, roads are narrow with passing places and you should drive very carefully and watch oncoming vehicles.

Coming along the coast on M3 would take even more time as after New Forest there are no motorways and almost to Exeter your driving speed will depend on traffic conditions (always add some spare time to your journey to get there as planned according to your schedule).

Bigbury on Sea

This town itself is like many other coastal towns but the most interesting site here is Burgh Island. You can reach the island from a nearby parking and walk to the top of the island during low tide; otherwise, the footpath is underwater. If you are not lucky enough and do not leave the island before high tide, there is a tractor which will bring you back from the island; this would cost you as little as £2 per person.

There is a pub and restaurant on the island but the most interesting may seem Burgh Island Hotel building, although the entrance to the hotel is only for guests living there. Hotel prices are high and there should be a reason to choose to stay there.

Hope Cove

After visiting Bigbury on Sea, we went to another, even more beautiful, place – Hope Cove.

One important detail I have to mention is that if you choose the shortest way to go from Bigbury on Sea to Hope Cove (via Aveton Gifford), you should consider tidal periods again; a tidal road along Avon River maybe five feet underwater during the high tide. However, it is worth going this route during low tide – it’s a really exciting experience and the views along the road around are beautiful.

Food

We decided to have seafood for lunch and went to Lobster Pod Bistro. This was a great experience – their seafood platter for two persons (costs around £40) was amazing.

Very fresh seafood, perfectly prepared and served with salad; the portion was big enough for two adults. Just to add that service was excellent too.

After lunch we went to the mall and had a little walk around the village which is very small. there are nice small shops and some pubs around.