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How Devon’s original seaside resort is making a comeback
From Victorian splendour to faded seaside resort and back again, Exmouth is rewriting its story; Richard Collett checks out this town in the midst of revival
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Your support makes all the difference.I’m standing on “The Beacon”. Regency-era hotels rise up behind me; ahead, 19th-century pleasure gardens roll down towards golden sands. From my vantage point above the promenade, I can see almost two miles of beach stretching from the Exe Estuary eastwards towards the red, sandstone cliffs marking the start (or the end) of the Jurassic Coast.
This is Exmouth, a seaside town with a gilded past that wowed Victorian pleasure seekers with its supposed “healing” sea waters and a climate to match the south of France. First recommended as a holiday destination by King George III’s personal physician in the 18th century, this south coast town is Devon’s original seaside resort.
In the 20th century, Exmouth was overtaken in popularity by its neighbours, including Devon destinations like Sidmouth and Salcombe, and the seafront was left to fade as visitors went elsewhere. But this town’s fortunes are reversing again – and now, with new restaurants, a beach bar, watersports centre and a new walking tour to its name, Exmouth is making a comeback.
As grand as it is, my attention isn’t being held by the seaside view in front of me. Rather, I’m avidly listening as Claire Martin, founder of Exmouth Tours, regales me with tales of the curious historical characters who fell in love with Exmouth during the heyday of its first tourism boom.
This unassuming street on the cliffs above the seafront promenade was once the most prestigious address in Devon, and rows of blue plaques name the famous people who lived, or visited, during the 18th and 19th centuries.
Lady Byron, a poet and the wife of Lord Byron, lived on this street; as did their daughter, Ada Lovelace, a mathematician who worked on the Analytical Engine, a machine considered to be the forerunner of computers.
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Lady Nelson, the estranged wife of Lord Nelson of Battle of Trafalgar fame, retired to Exmouth and is buried in a nearby church. The artist Francis Danby painted landscapes from the top of the cliffs, and Lord Moresby, who has the capital of Papua New Guinea named after him, also called The Beacon home when he wasn’t battling slave traders in the Indian Ocean.
The who’s who of the Georgian and then Victorian aristocracy visited Exmouth for extended summer breaks at a time when Europe was often closed off due to frequent revolutions and wars. The arrival of the railway in 1861 then sped up the overland journey to Exmouth, bringing mass tourism to the town’s beaches for the first time in its history.
Claire, who launched a new walking tour of Exmouth this summer, kept the stories coming as we walked down onto the Maer, a grassy nature reserve with views across to the red cliffs of the Jurassic Coast.
“Initially, when I moved to Exmouth during the pandemic, I wasn’t sure if it had enough history to warrant its own tour,” she said. “But once I started digging into the history, I found fascinating characters and tales everywhere.”
The Maer was once prime smuggling territory for Exmouth’s many illicit bootleggers, according to Claire. In the 18th century, one smuggler climbed up the cliffs with a barrel of brandy strapped to their back, only to trip over a donkey and wake up the coast guard. Before this, Exmouth had big connections with Elizabethan pirates – or the “privateers”, as they preferred to be known. Sir Walter Raleigh was born in East Budleigh, just up the road, and he’s thought to have launched his first expeditions against Spanish galleons and French merchant ships from Exmouth’s harbour.
But Exmouth’s history goes back, much, much further than this. “This isn’t only Devon’s oldest resort town,” said Claire. “It’s literally the oldest part of England’s only natural Unesco World Heritage Site – Dorset gets all the fame for being on the Jurassic Coast, but our cliffs in Exmouth are around 100 million years older!”
She’s not the only one keen to shout about the town’s credentials. “Exmouth has had a bumpy road over the past decade, never quite knowing if it was in decline or growth,” said George Nightingale, who has owned Spoken, a Mediterranean-style restaurant with one of the largest gin selections in the UK, for the last 12 years. “But the demand for coastal resorts has grown, and with it, new expectations and demands from its businesses. The increase in visitor numbers over the pandemic opened the eyes of those living in the immediate area as well as visitors from further afield.”
George, who calls Exmouth’s beach an “underappreciated asset” believes that Exmouth is evolving into the town it always deserved to be, but it’s been touch and go. In the 20th century, Exmouth’s fortunes waned as other Devonshire seaside resorts started to take the fame and attract more visitors. By the 21st century, Exmouth was better known as a retirement town than a holiday destination, with local councillors even warning in June 2023 that a large number of pensioners had brought the local economy to “saturation point”.
The glory days of Devon’s oldest beach resort are far from behind it, though, and despite its skewed demographics, Exmouth is revitalising its image in a bid to attract a younger generation.
“I’ve been visiting Exmouth all my life, and the town I live in today is very different to the town I used to visit as a child,” said Claire, whose new tour not only looks at the past, but the future of Exmouth too. “New businesses have opened up in masses.” These include Hangtime Cafe, Edge Watersports and restaurants like Vino 32, a wine bar serving Asian-fusion cuisine. With modern decor, contemporary features and diverse menus, they’re “embodying what people are nowadays looking for when they go on holiday”, says Claire.
The once-faded seafront was given a huge upgrade with the opening of the Sideshore Watersports Centre in 2021, which sits alongside a brand-new beach bar owned by local celebrity chef Michael Caines. In The Strand, Exmouth’s town square, the restaurants and bars are spilling outside as people enjoy al fresco drinks and small plates that wouldn’t be out of place on the French Riviera (if it weren’t for people drinking stouts from Exmouth’s microbrewery, The Grapevine, that is). A coworking space, Propeller, has taken over an empty building in the town, too, a sign that Exmouth, with its miles of beaches, has hopes it can boost its economy by attracting remote workers and digital nomads.
Claire finishes up her walking tour by the Clocktower on the seafront and leaves me with one last nugget of information about Devon’s oldest beach town. Even the Wetherspoons, here, she told me, has more history than most. In 2007, a remote-working Wall Street dealer on holiday made £55m cutting deals on the pub’s wifi – a moment which was immortalised by Hollywood in the film, The Big Short. Around every corner in Exmouth, there’s something unexpected to be found in Devon’s oldest beach resort.
Travel essentials
Getting there
Exmouth is connected to Exeter by direct trains and buses. From Exeter, London is 2.5 hours away by rail.
Staying there
Located on the Beacon, the Manor Hotel is a family-run hotel dating back to 1790. Standard double rooms start from £83 per night, room only.
Read our reviews of the best Devon hotels
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