Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
guins, punk-rocker-style tufted puffins and disarmingly cute bank cormorants. The Local
Coasts feature reveals the starfish, bizarre-looking cuttlefish and appealing seahorses that
inhabit the water just offshore. For optimum squawking and waddling, time your visit to
coincide with penguin breakfast (10.30am) or lunch (2.30pm).
Beaches
Torquay boasts 20 beaches and a surprising 22 miles of coast. Holidaymakers flock to the
central
Torre Abbey Sands
, which is covered by water at very high tides; the locals opt for the
sand-and-shingle beaches beside the 73m red-clay cliffs at
Babbacombe
. These can be ac-
cessed by a glorious 1920s
funicular railway
BEACH
01803-328750;
MAP
www.babbacombecliffrailway.co.uk
;
Babbacombe Downs Rd; adult/child return £2/1.30; 9.30am-4.45pm Feb-Oct,
to 6pm Jun-Sep)
, a memorable trip in a tiny wooden carriage that shuttles up and down rails
set into the cliff.
Meadfoot Beach
is a long strip of pebbles and sand;
Livermead Sands
is com-
pact and relatively quiet; while further west, Paignton seafront has a wide russet-tinged
stretch called
Paignton Sands
.
Paignton Zoo
( 0844 474 2222;
www.paigntonzoo.org.uk
;
Totnes Rd, Paignton; adult/child/family £13/10/41; 10am-5pm, to
4pm Nov-Mar; )
A conservation charity runs this innovative zoo, set on an 32-hectare site
dotted with spacious enclosures recreating habitats as varied as savannah, wetlands, trop-
ical forest and desert. Highlights are the orang-utan island, the vast glass-walled lion en-
closure, and a lemur wood, where you walk over a plank suspension bridge as the prim-
ates leap around in the surrounding trees.
But the real must-see is the crocodile swamp: a steamy enclave overflowing with trop-
ical vegetation, where raised pathways wind over and beside Nile, Cuban and saltwater
crocs, some up to 6m long. There's also a glass-free zone where a 10m reticulated python
sits, hopefully, just out of reach.
ZOO
Torquay Museum
MAP
MUSEUM
GOOGLE MAP
( 01803-293975;
www.torquaymuseum.org
; 529 Babbacombe Rd, Torquay; adult/child £5/3; 10am-5pm Mon-
Sat, 11am-4pm Sun Jul-mid-Sep)
The unique collection of Agatha Christie memorabilia here in-
cludes photos and handwritten notes, plus display cases devoted to her famous detectives.
It also does a superb job of evoking the genteel turn-of-the-20th-century watering hole
Torquay was when Christie was a child.
