It was overcast when we started out but has ended up fine and sunny with the temperature well over 25C. Most unEnglish.

Today we went on a small side trip to Sidmouth. The reason being that Lynette has bought one or two items from Goviers who sell china. The distance by the “fast” route on the GPS, was a mere 27 miles, but that still took nearly an hour, by the time we had crawled our way through the narrow roads at either end.

At Sidmouth, it is very common, where the road is only one way, to have a strip of 50 yards or more, just like a one way bridge in NZ. I heard the nettles and blackberry pinging off the car when we moved left, more today than I have heard for a few days. Like most coastal towns we found, there is a very steep road down into the town.

Sidmouth is a nice old coastal town which is being flooded with tourists. These tourists are more elderly and from the UK, by the looks of things. The Esplanade has lots of old hotels and the streets near the Esplanade are selling ice creams and souveniers. The beach is very stony and Lynette said the water was quite cool. On the footpath above the beach, you could hire a deck chair and if you were really serious, UKP30 would get you the seasonal use of one, which probably means you could buy your own deck chair for about UKP20.

We stumbled on a car park next to the Information Centre and had a good wander around the town. We stopped off at Goviers and introduced ourselves to the folk there. They were pleased to meet someone who is just a name and email address.

We poked around a few antique shops, had a bite to eat and an ice cream on the promenade. The ice cream shop had plenty of flavours and I tried the White and Stem Ginger, which was one of the best ice creams that I have had in the UK.

We then drove towards Beer, another little coastal town. After coming down the very steep hill, we managed to find a free car park. That's a very rare thing here. Mind you it was only for 30 minutes but we pushed that a bit. The first thing that you notice in Beer is the water flowing in the giant gutter. The gutter is channel about 18 inches wide and the water rushes down. There's quite a gradient. Lynette spoke to one of the locals and he said that it was only part of the river that flowed under the town, but didn't know much more.

Down at the beach the local large boats were on the stony beach. The angle down to the water was quite steep, so there was no bathing, and launching a boat would not take much effort. It was a wonderfully fine day.

We had travelled 27 miles to Beer, so decided to set the GPS to “Easy” mode. It still took us over some narrow roads, but not as many as going there. However, we covered 37 miles in order to get back to the Reed Hall.

We dined at the Imperial pub again and had a pleasant meal out in the open air. When we left at 8PM, it was starting to cool down but it was not unpleasant.

We packed the extra bag and loaded it up to 19kg, so all our other stuff has to fit in our remaining two bags. That may be a challenge.

Here's a very narrow piece of road that has a Give Way sign on it.

Goviers.

The High St of Sidmouth is very busy.

The Rolls Royce of mobility scooters.

Sidmouth beach

Deck chairs by the yard.

The cliffs at this end of the beach hold lots of fossils.

More deck chairs

Fancy windows.

Above and Below - Beer.  Note the water channel on the right.

Deck chairs looking for customers on Beer beach.

Boats waiting for hire or the next tide.

The Beer beach is quite steep.

Well fed local wildlife at Reed Hall.