Barnstaple Town Centre :: Accommodation Guide

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The Old Station House Inn, Kentisbury Tel: 01598 763520 Site

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Blackmoor Gate, the western gateway to the Exmoor National Park, sits on the watershed between tributaries of the rivers Yeo and Heddon nearly 305m (1000 feet) above sea level. It has long been a crossing of tracks – an ancient ridgeway following the former moorland ridge from the heights of Exmoor down to the sea at Mortehoe. The road from Lynton to Barnstaple crosses here at a low point of the ridge, as did the former Lynton & Barnstaple Railway. Of which the former station is now the 'The Old Station Inn'

Travelling the four compass points takes you to stunning scenery and fantastic places. Lynton and Lynmouth, Ilfracombe and Combe Martin, Barnstaple and Bideford and last but by no means least South Molton and onwards to Exeter. You are a stones throw from some of the most beautiful and rugged coastlines and moorlands.

Locally, until the middle of the 19th century, open moorland ran to the east of the road between here and Parracombe with a gate onto the moor at this point. The name comes from that of the Blackmore family who owned this and much more land elsewhere around Parracombe. R. D. Blackmore, author of the famous Exmoor book Lorna Doone, stayed in the area during his childhood.

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Click on Tourism for information on the area, Attractions for what to do and where to go, Food and Drink on what to eat when you get there, Leisure... well relax and think about that one and the Town Centre to shop till you drop!