Visiting Clovelly
Clovelly is a beautiful, picturesque fishing village, steeped in maritime atmosphere and history. It was once owned by the Queen of England!
Book TicketsA huge thank you to BBC Countryfile Magazine for featuring us as one of Britain’s prettiest fishing villages. They had this to say:
“Exquisite Clovelly is as ancient as it is quaint. It was first noted in the Domesday book as belonging to William the Conqueror’s wife, before three great Devon families ruled this sea estate for the next 800 years. Fishing boats were built using trees from the steep forest around and trade was established with Wales, across the Bristol channel. Outgoing boats were stocked with herring and returned laden with Welsh limestone, which was burnt in kilns with ‘culm’ to produce a lime used to fertilise, or ‘sweeten’, the acidic Devon soil. Herring made Clovelly wealthy, but as with so many British coastal fishing ports, their decline brought poverty to the whole coast.”
“Today the village prospers again: there is freshly caught bass and crab at the Red Lion Hotel bar and its bustling harbour is filled with visitors fishing from the quay or wandering its steep, car-less cobbled streets, enjoying its stories and galleries.”