Tuesday, 8 July 2008

After yesterday’s exertions we slept very well. We rose this morning determined to repeat the experience. Driving to Lyme Regis I saw a sign “Visit Colyton - the rebel town”. Almost instinctively I turned off for Colyton. We found a delightful village with an excellent traditional market and some good shops (including a second-hand bookshop). The beautiful church houses one of the rare Vinegar Bibles where the word Vineyard is replaced (presumably by bored typesetters) with the word Vinegar. The church also has one of the distinctive short towers that are such a feature of Devon. The villagers earned their “rebel” title as staunch supporters of Monmouth’s Protestant rebellion against James II.

Back at Lyme Regis we headed straight out of town and spent the whole of a wonderful day enthusiastically fossiling and collected some prize specimens.

We finally dragged ourselves away at about 6:00 pm as we had to head off and find a hotel for the night. We headed to Yeovil tired and hungry but we could not find a hotel with vacancies. Then we passed a small country pub complete with Morris Dancers; they had good victuals and a bed for the night and we were very pleased: only our exhaustion prevented us joining in with the Morris Dancing.