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Recommendation wanted - Looking for a few home base options to explore Dartmoor and Cornwall Region

Posted by on

My wife and I are taking a two-week anniversary trip to England in September. In 2018, we did a two week grand tour of England. This time around we want to focus on the west country (Cornwall, Devon) and do more of the things we enjoy doing daily (hiking and biking). After landing at Heathrow, we'll be busing to Bath, doing 2 nights in Bath and one night in Wells. After that, we want to have only 1 or two more home bases until we head back to stay near Heathrow 10 days later.

Near Dartmoor, towns with names like: Okehampton, Tavistock, Moretonhampsted, Yelverton, Bovey Tracey, or Princetown keep coming up, but right now they are just names on a Google Map.

In the past, we have generally enjoyed being in towns similar to Keswick in Cumbria, where a grocery store, outdoor store, bike rental shop, and some decent restaurants that have Glutten Free options are located. Looking for a town of the same ilk near Dartmoor. Same for someplace in Cornwall. Centrally located that we can use as a base of operations for day hikes and bicycle rides. We will have a car, so even someplace just outside a town is fine (and preferred). Quaint accommodation is also preferred. We live in a 1890's house here in the US, so I'm used to old door knobs coming off in my hands and find this "charming".

Any and all accommodation suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.

Bob

Posted by
769 posts

Tavistock might suit you. It’s a very nice handsome market town, lots of old houses, a really good undercover market in a historic building, a river and lots of independent shops, including a lovely little bookshop and a selection of cafes. But also big enough to have a couple of supermarkets on the outskirts and to supply pretty much everything you want.

Really a nice place and right on the edge of Dartmoor.

I find Princetown quite bleak and there’s not a huge amount in the way of shops etc. It’s pretty small.

I don’t know the others very well.

Posted by
53 posts

Thank you for this guidance and your help. This is the kind of boots-on-the-ground information I'm looking for!

Posted by
134 posts

I’ll be on the RS south England tour on June 27. Our tour goes to Dartmoor, and we will be staying at the Three Crowns in Chagford. It looks like the sort of hotel that you described. I’m looking forward to staying there.
Cheers

Posted by
1344 posts

I was thinking myself that, while in Devon as opposed to Cornwall, Chagford is handy for Dartmoor. Also Lynton/Lynmouth on the north Devon coast (Exmoor) is rather good and I have a soft spot for Dartmouth and the area round there including Totnes (but not Paignton regrettably) on the south coast.

Ivybridge I wasn’t taken with especially and can’t particularly recommend. I had a fleeting average overnight in Widdecombe-in-the-Moor and the area around it is very interesting, being in the heart of Dartmoor, but we didn’t get to explore much as, being on the Two Moors Way, we arrived in the evening and left the next morning.

Maybe somebody with more local knowledge or experience will weigh in with some other suggestions actually in Cornwall!

Ian

Posted by
769 posts

Tavistock is handy for parts of Cornwall as well!

I only know the coastal towns of Cornwall, not the inland towns. Looe is very touristy but lovely and busy. Falmouth is a great place - it’s a proper big town with an actual university, the world’s third largest natural harbour (after Sydney and Rio, apparently) and some good beaches. Loads of shops and restaurants.

On the north coast, and not far from Devon, Bude is an unpretentious little Cornish coast town.

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