Ottery St Mary

The glory of Ottery St Mary is its magnificent 14th-century Church of St Mary. From the outside, St Mary’s looks part mini-cathedral, part Oxford college. Both impressions are justified since, when Bishop Grandisson commissioned the building in 1337, he stipulated that it should be modelled on his own cathedral at Exeter. He also wanted it to be “a sanctuary for piety and learning”, so accommodation for 40 scholars was provided.

The interior is just as striking. The church’s medieval treasures include a brilliantly-coloured altar screen, canopied tombs, and a 14th-century astronomical clock showing the moon and the planets, which still functions with its original machinery.

Ottery’s Vicar during the mid 18th century was the Rev John Coleridge whose 13th child became the celebrated poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The family home near the church has since been demolished but in one of his poems Samuel recalls

“my sweet birth-place, and the old church-tower
Whose bells, the poor man’s only music, rang
From morn to evening, all the hot Fair-day”

A bronze plaque in the churchyard wall honours Ottery’s most famous son. It shows his profile, menaced by the albatross that features in his best-known poem, The Ancient Mariner.

It’s a delight to wander around the narrow, twisting lanes that lead up from the River Otter, admiring the fine Georgian buildings amongst which is an old wool manufactory by the riverside, a dignified example of early industrial architecture.

An especially interesting time to visit Ottery is on the Saturday closest to 5 November. The town’s Guy Fawkes celebrations include a time-honoured, if rather alarming, tradition of rolling barrels of flaming tar through the narrow streets.

About a mile northwest of Ottery, Cadhay is a beautiful Tudor mansion built around 1550 but incorporating the Great Hall of an earlier mansion built between 1420 and 1470. The house was built for a Lincoln’s Inn lawyer, John Haydon, whose great-nephew Robert Haydon later added the exquisite Long Gallery, thus forming a unique and attractive courtyard. Opening times are restricted.

Close by is Escot Park and Gardens where visitors can see an arboretum and rose garden, along with a collection of wildlife that includes wild boar, pot-bellied pigs, otters and birds of prey. The original gardens in this 1200-acre estate were set out by Capability Brown and have been restored by the land artist and television gardener, Ivan Hicks.