Nine Pints

There's nothing like watching a lunchtime football match - Arsenal v Sheffield United, FA Cup 5th Round - down your favourite pub. In my case, this is the Mint, at the top of Fore Street, Exeter.

This pub was renovated - expensively, by the look of it - about a year ago; it has paid dividends. There are more people in this pub than ever before. Even during the week. And that's not just because of the cheap, £1.50 lager (weekdays, weekends 7-9pm).

It's all a bit sleek now; swish, shiney, light wooden bar and neon lights behind the counter which change colour constantly. They even have Mint uniform for the bar staff now. All very professional and yet they've kept their old-men customers aplenty. At the weekend, they're all joined by masses of young, incredibly attractive women. There are loads of them.

Well, when you've finished with the Sheffield United game - they got a thoroughly deserved draw and replay, courtesy of a last-minute penalty - there is yet more football to come. It's Saturday afternoon, after all. Neil Warnock is one of my favourite managers; he could work very well in the Premier League, where he will probably take the Blades this season. He is that rare thing in football - a manager who is managing his own, home town football club. Get on!

You have the Sky One football service and the charming, very likeable Jeff Stelling, the presenter. He's been doing this show for a few years and is the epitomy of charm and professionalism. He really is an unsung hero of British television.

Today, tellingly, Stelling is joined in the studio by Phil Thompson, assistant manager at Liverpool. That just about sums it all up. Liverpool booted out of the FA Cup by Burnley; Phil Thompson with nothing much to do on a Saturday afternoon. Maybe it gives Liverpool some rest before Bayer Leverkusen, midweek. (A hard week's football coming up with Barcelona v Chelsea on Wednesday).

Anyway, it drags on, I only have £13 but somehow manage to drink nine pints by the end of the evening. This includes a quick visit - with E - to the new Zephyr bar, just a few yards further up the hill. £1.23 for a pint of Carling - how ridiculous can it get? What happens when the 24 hour drinking arrives?

J very kindly picks me up at the end of the evening.

Budleigh Salterton

No month is ever complete without a visit to the delightful, typically English resort of Budleigh Salterton. And never more so than in the summer.

This is the real start of the Jurassic Coast, where the enormous red sandstone cliffs - 200ft tall - line the pebbly beach which stretches for probably three miles past Budleigh Salterton. In the summer, you have a quaint little kiosk serving teas, cakes, snacks, ice creams and stuff, and you can sit there just admiring the sea and the quietness, sipping a mug of tea, watching the occasional seagull trying to make a living. A read of the sport section goes down well, too.

It's 75p for a mug of tea although, regretably, they don't let you have your own tea bag - always the best way of making a cup of tea - but just top-up the tea pot now and then (a bit of a rip-off, really).

I've chatted a few times to the old woman who runs the place. Indeed, the little concrete patio is a nice place to have a friendly little chat with a whole variety of people (they seem mostly to be locals, not holidaymakers). Of course, if it's a hot and sunny day and too crowded on the patio, you might have to try placing your white plastic garden chair on the chunky pebbles, difficult but possible.

Budleigh Salterton is built on a hill that slopes down to the estuary of the River Otter, at the very far, eastern end, towards Otterton Ledge. Here, you can see the famous line of about ten pine trees, just standing there on their own, sheltering plain grasslands. (They appear in most postcards from this town). At this point, also, the cliffs have petered out and you have a shingle bank beside the Otter; if you want to reach the other side you now have to go about two miles inland.

I never go this far along and always prefer the western end of the beach. Most of the town itself is actually a good few feet above sea level and there is a point - at Rolle Road, in the middle of the town - where you walk south along a little lane towards the sea and look straight into the sky, going uphill slightly. This is just above the kiosk.

There are walls and blocks of flats and houses on each side and as you walk along you just see metal handrails and, hopefully, a clear blue sky at the very end. When you actually reach the clifftop, the whole panorama ahead is surely as fine as anything on offer in the south of France. It could be the Cote d'azur but for the pebbles. You have the whole sweeping bay before you, stretching on the right over three miles towards Littleham Cove and Straight Point (with the private Sandy Bay invisible, just the other side).

In the summer, you could have one thousand people on the beach below. The kiosk could have a queue of thirty people and people are streaming up and down the steps constantly.

This town is the surely the antidote to the noise and clamour of Exmouth. You won't find any nightclubs here, just fine, traditional English shops, like butchers, cafes (and too many estate agents, of course). It has no town square, just a narrow high street, shop-lined until they give way on one side to a small stream and grass bank.

The town is big enough to accommodate most of the high street banks and even a Rover car-dealership on one side. There are classy restaurants and delicatessens, too, and the usual glut of charity shops, including Oxfam. It is the only town of its size that has no major supermarket, just the small Co-op down the end.

Today, I came with C and M, the two Portuguese friends from Exeter. It is February and bloody freezing - the recent mild spell has been taken over by a blast from Arctic, it feels like.

I drove the usual, longer but quicker route, through Pinhoe, Blackhorse Lane, past Exeter Airport and then out to Aylesbeare and Woodbury Common. We stopped at Woodbury Castle for a few minutes, at the summit of the barren heathland of the common. You can see the sea from up here, about five miles away; in the summer it is so brilliant and wonderful.

I must do some research on what John Betjeman wrote about Budleigh Salterton.

Guide to Budleigh Salterton (with pictures):
http://www.budleigh-salterton-guide.co.uk/

East Devon Area of Oustanding Natural Beauty:
http://www.eastdevonaonb.org.uk/default.asp