Trentishoe

A High Parish Above the Heddon Valley

Trentishoe has no shop or pub of its own. St Peter's Church sits high on the coastal summit, with a narrow embattled west tower, and the rest of the parish is scattered down the hillsides toward the sea. What brings people here lies below the church: the deep wooded cleft of the Heddon Valley, where a river runs through ancient oak woodland to a pebble cove between some of the highest sea cliffs in England. Barnstaple, seventeen miles off, is the nearest station, and larger vehicles are advised to use the Blackmoor Gate route.

The walking starts at the National Trust car park in the valley. The gentle path to Heddon's Mouth is about two miles there and back, an hour at an easy pace, following the river to a nineteenth-century lime kiln above the beach; limestone and coal once came in across the channel to be burnt there for the acid soil, and the Trust rebuilt the kiln in 1982. The path is stony but graded for all-terrain pushchairs and rough-terrain mobility scooters, which you can borrow from the welcome hub. Keep dogs on leads near the livestock. For something harder there is a 3.5-mile clifftop circuit and a six-mile route along an old carriageway to Woody Bay. In the woods you might see an otter, a dipper or a grey wagtail; the heather comes out in August and the gorse smells of coconut into early autumn.

Food at the Heddon Valley Trailhead

At the trailhead is The Hunters Inn, taken over in 2025 by Mark, Debs and the Walton family. The kitchen works with coast-landed fish, Exmoor beef and seasonal vegetables, does a Sunday roast, and the steak pie by the fire is the dish its reviewers single out. It keeps Exmoor Fox on regularly alongside a changing guest beer, has a dog-friendly beer garden, and, as a National Trust tenancy, spending there supports conservation and access work in the valley. Beside the car park, The Pantry sells barista coffee, traybakes and Styles ice cream made locally with Jersey milk — including a version for the dog.

The Fox & Goose at Parracombe

Over at Parracombe, the Fox & Goose is the other option, food-led, with head chef Gabri in the kitchen and Craig and Aidan's corgis about the place. A sample menu has included a West Country beef burger and a pulled ham-hock burger, a chicken tikka sourdough sandwich, an onion-bhaji kebab, and beer-battered haddock or halloumi. Two changing cask ales, usually from the Exmoor Brewery, and local cider. A fresh-fish van and a mobile Post Office call here.

Cairns, Curate and Whole Earth Fayre

The recorded history is sparse. Two Bronze Age burial cairns sit on the summit of Trentishoe Down. James Hannington began as curate of Martinhoe and Trentishoe in 1874; he later became a missionary bishop in East Africa, and his biographer wrote that "the people crowded into the little church to see their old friend in his new garb." And in 1973 the cliff top hosted the Trentishoe Whole Earth Fayre, with Hawkwind and the Pink Fairies playing to the moor.

Harry's Orchard

Back down on the Heddon path, a small orchard has been planted and named for Harry Westcott, who worked here for the National Trust. It is a quiet place to finish a walk.