h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Congratulations on changing the name back, Paff!

'Towns and Countryside' entry has been submitted mto PR - the thread is at F48874?thread=2140109

I hope everyone's happy with it; please post any changes or alterations here or on the PR thread!

Oh, and the entry is here - A8671980

I thought this might be the best place for a quick cut-n-paste of the text for the North Devon Coast bit of the 'Towns and Countryside' entry. I've done it in gMl again. Hope that's OK.

I'm afraid I really did try to keep it down, but it's still almost 400 words. I'm really concerned about the length, but thought it best to just get it posted here rather than keep fiddling with it chopping out the odd word here 'n' there.

So, here it is...

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North Devon Coast


Starting at the top - quite literally - is Exmoor. Devon's border with Somerset runs through the middle of Exmoor. Pick the right bit of road to drive along and you will find yourself in Devon one minute, Somerset the next, then back in Devon before you know it. Exmoor has everything you could want from an area of National Park: hills and valleys, open moorland and forest, babbling brooks and rushing water falls. All this, plus quaint villages where duck racing is about as fast paced as life ever gets. Although Exmoor falls behind it's big brother Dartmoor in both size and sheer wildness, it has one thing that Dartmoor lacks: coastline. Rocky, rugged, craggy coastline.



Along that northern section of Devon's coastline are the seaside towns of Lynton and Lynmouth, Combe Martin and Ilfracombe. These typically Victorian English seaside resorts all have their fair share of chip shops, amusement arcades and kiss-me-quick hat vendors.



Heading around the corner and southwards, much of the coastline is owned by the National Trust. The bits in between - the beaches - are a surfer's paradise. Woolacombe, Croyde and Saunton are populated for most of the year by board carrying, rubber wearing, VW van driving, beautifully bronzed people who look like they would taste of salt.



The expanse of beach at Saunton runs down towards Barnstaple or Bideford Bayyes, that's its name - Barnstaple or Bideford Bay.. This is where the rivers Taw and Torridge meet and open out into sea. Just across from Bideford, is Westward Ho! Famous for two things: being the only place in the world to have an exclamation mark as part of its name, and being named after the fictional place in Charles Kingsley's book Westward Ho!



Continuing southwest is the quintessential Devon village of Clovelly. There are four things you must do in Clovelly: walk down the steep main street, buy some postcards, drink some scrumpy, and pay for the Land Rover ride back up.



The coastline from Clovelly out to Hartland Point and down to the Cornish border becomes quite similar to that of the northern most part of Devon's coast. It has that rugged feel again. The cliffs seem steep. The footpaths seem perilous. The wind always whistles. The waves always crash. Oh, the North Devon coast, how we love it!


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Paff

I've noticed after posting above that place names shouldn't be in bold. Sorry about that.

Another thing I should mention here is that I've brought the Westward Ho! paragraph out of the 'Devonshire Dales and Tarka Country' section into the 'North Devon Coast' section (where it should've always been). To explain:
- Basically the 4th para of 'ND Coast' has two opening sentences about Saunton sands then goes into the Westward Ho bit.
- However, instead of "Across from Bideford, on the North Devon coast proper, is ...", I've put "Just across from Bideford, is...".
- Then, where Westward Ho! is removed from 'DD and TC', the opening para will need to say something like "South from Bideford, following the river Torridge..." instead of "South from here, following the river Torridge...".

Hope that makes sense.

Paff

Looks good, Paff - I think I've got it as you envisaged!

Just to let anyone still interested that the (almost) complete County entry is now in the Edited Guide Writing Workshop - all comments welcome!

A6021505

I thought it was on the front page last week? Woss going on?

That was a seperate entry - I hived off the towns and villages into a different one, as the whole thing was becoming enormous! The T&C was on the FP, but this one is still going

Ah, that would explain why it didn't read at all like the entry I remembered .