Rick Stein, Doc Martin & River Cottage...all in one day!

Wednesday 25^th September

We said farewell to Clive and David this morning. We told them we'd highly recommend their B&B to all of our friends and relatives. Please be in touch if you’re ever travelling to Cornwall and we’ll give you the contact details…it is the PERFECT place to stay.

First stop today was Padstow, a charming working fishing port surrounded by sandy beaches. The town's gorgeous setting at the head of the Camel River Estuary and the natural beauty of the surrounding area – its rugged coastline, quiet coves and walking paths make it a great place to spend some time. We walked to the nearest headland and the view was breathtaking…here’s a small portion of it…

This photo of the village was taken from the same walking path…

I have to admit that the main reason I wanted to visit Padstow was the Rick Stein factor. His business now operates four restaurants, a bistro, a café, a seafood delicatessen, patisserie shop, a gift shop and a cookery school. His impact on the local economy of Padstow is such that it has been nicknamed “Padstein”.

Next stop was Port Isaac, a traditional fishing village in North Cornwall and home to the TV series Doc Martin played by Martin Clunes. We’ve recently discovered and started watching this wonderful program and look forward to watching it when we get home and being able to relate to the setting.

Doc Martins house

This hotel is used as the village school. The entire cast move into the village in March each year and stay until June…they work around the locals and it seems to work well for both parties.

It's a truly picturesque village with narrow winding streets lined with whitewashed cottages that head down to the harbour where we watched local fishermen landing their daily catch.

Here’s one of Andrew’s artistic shots of some lobster pots.

We browsed through some of the local galleries and arts and craft shops before having our last Cornish pasty in Cornwall. 

We both agreed that they were the best yet.

On the pathway along the cliffs to the carpark 

Andrew spotted this seagull.

We then left Cornwall and travelled through Devon toward Lyme-Regis where we spend the next two nights. We wanted to stop along the way through Devon for a REAL Devonshire Tea…when we passed a sign that pointed to Axminster only 1 mile down a side road we decided to visit the ‘River Cottage’ Canteen. We had our ‘Cream Tea’ there which is what the locals call a Devonshire Tea & were very happy with it. It’s been quite a TV day for us. River Cottage is another of our favourite TV cooking shows.

We arrived in Lyme-Regis at about 4.30pm and met our host Jacqui, she gave us a map of the town highlighted with points of interest and places to eat. She explained the features of the rooms…once again we’re very happy with our accommodation, it lives up to the photos on the website…

After settling in we walked into town and had dinner in a Thai restaurant, we had a great view of the harbour. We haven’t had Thai food since we left home and we contemplated the fact that this time next week we will be home.