Devon
in South West England

The only county in England with two separate coastlines, which already tells you something about its ambitions. The north coast faces the Bristol Channel with steep cliffs, long surf beaches, and the kind of weather that arrives sideways; Croyde and Saunton are serious breaks with serious devotees. The south coast is softer, the Salcombe estuary sliding into the sea between green hills, the South Hams villages tucked into valleys where the lanes are too narrow to pass anything larger than mild anxiety. Dartmoor sits in the middle, a granite moorland of tors, ponies, and bogs that the weather uses as a testing ground. Exeter has a fine cathedral and a food scene that has quietly got very good. The cream tea debate, jam first or cream first, remains technically unresolved and entirely worth having on the correct side of the county border.