Lee Bay is a delightful place to visit at any time of the year. The rocky cove is great for rock-pooling and as the tide falls a sandy beach appears. It’s a great place for kayaking too, especially with a boat rod or line when the mackerel are running. Visit on the falling tide and you can take a ‘secret’ path cut through the rock to neighbouring Sandy Cove with its wonderful flat stone shingle. You can either have a stone skimming competition or challenge each other to see how high you can stack them. Don’t worry about getting cut off as the tide comes in. There are wooden steps up the side of the cliff you can climb up then walk back into the village.
Smugglers Tea Room overlooks the bay and is open during the peak season, serving teas, light lunches and, of course, the compulsory Devon ice cream!
There’s more to Lee than just a beach, the village itself is very pretty and well worth a walk round. Be sure to call in to the Grampus pub, a proper, traditional hostelry with great beer and delicious food. Drop in on open mike night and the landlord, Bill, is sure to be up there playing his fiddle.
The Old School Room Craft Gallery has a wealth of beautiful things where you can choose yourself a souvenir of your holiday in North Devon or a gift for someone at home.
Locally Lee is often referred to as “Fuchsia Valley” – during the flowering season, many of the hedgerows along the lanes and in the village are ablaze with the scarlet flowers.
If you enjoy walking then Lee Bay is a good place to start, with free parking down by the bay and opportunities for coastal as well as countryside walks. Head eastwards along the South West Coast Path to Ilfracombe or west towards Mortehoe and Bull Point, then make your way inland and return to Lee through the beautiful countryside.
On a hot summer’s day there’s no better place to be as Lee remains relatively undiscovered and, as you swim out to one of the rocks, you sometimes feel you could be on some exotic foreign shore!