Old Berry Wood

Walk into Old Berry Wood and you're immediately wrapped in proper woodland - the kind where sunlight filters through oak and beech in shafts of gold. It's a genuine forest rather than a managed park, which means it feels like you've actually gone somewhere rather than ticked off a tourist box.

The paths wind through dense cover, and you'll spot the occasional clearing where bluebells spread if you time it right in spring. It's the sort of place where kids can properly explore without feeling herded - they can hunt for bugs, clamber over fallen logs, build dens. There's something about a real wood that beats a play park every time.

Getting here from Tiverton takes barely ten minutes by car, which makes it ideal for a half-day outing or a proper walk if you're after fresh air without driving hours. Allow two to three hours if you've got children who dawdle (and frankly, they should). If you're staying at Nirvana Glamping nearby, it's absolutely worth combining with a woodland morning before heading back for lunch.

Bring wellies unless it's been bone dry for a week - the ground gets boggy. There's no formal car park that I could find, just roadside parking, so arrive early if it's a weekend. Free to wander, which is how these things should be. It's not dramatic or Instagram-worthy, but that's precisely why it works. Real forest, real quiet, real value.