The place its near is Otterton in Devon. Facebook followers may remember I posted photos of it when I went there but others will not have seen them, so I will put some on here too.
Otterton is a beautiful village, near to Budleigh Salterton. I read on the internet that it is actually the best place to park if you want to go to Ladram Bay, famous for its sea stacks.
If you want to park in Ladram Bay it costs £5 (for a day ticket) - more than I paid for lunch and parking combined at the mill in Otterton! So, if you plan to go and would prefer a 3/4 mile walk each way, rather than paying £5 to park, park at Otterton Mill.
Otterton Mill occupies a beautiful spot on the river Otter and is a wonderful combination of things, as well as being a working mill. Its a celebrated cafe - restaurant (the newest chef came from The River Cottage Canteen in Axminster, where I visited for letter A of this tour!). It also has a Devon Food Shop, an art gallery and craft shop, live music and special events in the evenings, courses and workshops and an artesian bakery.
If you would like to have a look for yourself click HERE
I arrived at lunch time, so had a bit of a snack before heading off to Ladram Bay. I chose the Red Pepper, Roasted Tomato and Lentil Soup with homemade granary bread, made at the on site bakery. There was a good choice of seating areas. Many people were sitting outside in the courtyard, but I chose to go upstairs in the mill building. The soup was so good and served in a great big bowl - I imagine it would be a fantastic winter warmer too. It came served with two big hunks of homemade bread and butter. Simple and delicious! They have a great menu, using locally sourced ingredients, including crabs, which I saw later at Ladram Bay.
Anyway, before I go on to Ladram Bay which was the main focus of my journey today, here are some pictures of the mill and the lovely Otterton village.
The entrance to the Mill from the large, riverside car park. Everywhere I looked today at the mill there were flowers in full bloom!
Sign outside the shop - which sells all sorts of delicious bread and scones, along with all this stuff and lots more temptingness!
A small corner of the courtyard dining area
And now just a few pictures of the inside of the mill - it wasn't milling today, but does so regularly.
A milling stone
Off to the main focus of the journey now - Ladram Bay. I was looking forward to seeing the giant sea stacks which it is renowned for and I was not to be disappointed.
I followed the main road to the beach at Ladram, well signposted from the village which I had to walk through to get there. Here are a couple of pictures of Otterton Village that I took as I walked. Its a beautiful chocolate box village, lined with, thatched cottages.
After a nice 10 or 15 minute walk I arrived at Ladram Bay.
There is a holiday park there - mainly static caravans and there is a campsite too. You have to walk through the holiday park to get to the beach.
It looked to me to be a very large holiday park and to have good facilities, but I am no holiday park expert. It had a swimming pool and an ice skating rink and lots of other stuff to keep children happy and a little village centre with a child friendly restaurant.
The first sea stacks I saw.
The Otter sandstone which forms the cliffs and seastacks at Ladram Bay was deposited in hot dry climates in the triassic period, about 220 million years ago! The striking red colour (caused by iron oxide) tells us that the climate was hot and dry for most of the year, similar to that of parts of the Arabian Gulf and South Africa at this present time.
The presence of ripple marks and channels in the sandstones, together with the remains of long extinct plants, insects, reptiles, fish and amphibians shows that the dessert was at times crossed by fertile river valleys.
The sandstones contain numerous vertical fractures (joints) that formed deep in the earth's crust during past mountain building periods. The sea picked out these planes of weakness to form caves and natural arches that collapsed to produce sea stacks. These at Ladram Bay are some of the best examples in Britain.
Those are the last of the picture I took on my phone. The battery then went and I took the last few on the beach with my new standby camera (a £7 Asda special!!)
After spending a nice relaxing time walking up on the cliffs (the South West Coast Path runs through here) and sitting on the beach I headed back to Otterton via a stinging nettle lined public footpath, a pretty and very narrow path back to the village.
Before heading home I popped back into the mill for a coffee and a lovely chunk of homemade fruit and nut flapjack in the courtyard. A perfect end to the day. 50 minutes later I was home and downloading the photos! I am so lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the country!
Next time I may go a bit bananas and visit somewhere completly different for letter M! See you then!
