Campsites in Exmoor National Park

Exmoor is one of 15 designated national parks in the UK. Places that have been deemed worthy of protecting thanks to their beautiful countryside, cultural heritage and wildlife. This winning combination also means that each of them are fantastic places to holiday - and particularly good for camping and glamping holidays. Choose to camp in Exmoor and you will be surrounded by the beautiful countryside that helped it earn its national park status back in the 1950s. You’ll have the best chance of seeing the wildlife and you can spend days out and about discovering the area’s cultural heritage too.

It’s always the Hipcamp team’s mission to find the best campsites in the areas we promote and visit. When it comes to looking for the best campsites in Exmoor - that can mean a number of different things. Which is the best Exmoor campsite for you will all depend on what kind of camper you are - and what kind of holiday you want. You might like to immerse yourself in rural scenery and rolling hills, to camp next to a stream or to enjoy a sea view. And then, in addition to the wide choice of landscapes, there’s the standard choice between camping, glamping and places that accept campervans. Decisions, decisions….

Classic camping in Exmoor

If you’re looking to pitch your own tent or park up in a campervan in Exmoor, you’ll be after a classic campsite. As somewhere that’s been attracting people on holidays since the time of the Romantic poets, Exmoor has plenty of classic campsites. The ones we tend to favour are smaller and usually independently-owned and run - but that’s where the similarities between them ends. There are many things that can make a campsite cool - sometimes it’s a spectacular location, sometimes it is the owners themselves and sometimes it’s the facilities on site. But our range can encompass everything from the most-basic of tents-only sites, where a cold water tap is about as luxurious as it gets, to campsites where there are pizza ovens, communal covered kitchens, family bathrooms and electric hook-ups.

Glamping in Exmoor

If you’re really looking to make campsite life easy, why not step things up a little and go for one of the sites that offers glamping in Exmoor? Glamping options range from bell tents where you might simply get a tent that’s been pre-pitched for you, through yurts and tipis to shepherds’ huts and treehouses. In fact, these days the range of glamping options is so huge, and growing all the time, that it would be difficult to list them all here. The very concept of glamping was borne out of a desire to add a touch of glamour to the world of camping so it spans an extraordinary range of accommodation that ranges from places that simply make camping easier to places which are nothing short of luxurious.

Exmoor’s National Park status

Exmoor National Park was designated back in 1954, just a few years after the very first national parks were created. It covers an area of 267 square miles in North Devon and Somerset including a 37-mile stretch of coastline on the Bristol Channel. This coastline, between Minehead in the east and Coombe Martin in the west, includes the highest sea cliffs in England. The coastal hills facing the Bristol Channel rise to 433 metres and the highest sheer cliff, Great Hangman, is 244 metres above sea level. A quarter of the land within the national park is moorland with heather and gorse in abundance. It is milder and wetter than moorlands in the north and is managed differently as it is used for grazing livestock rather than grouse shooting. Grazing and swaling (burning vegetation back to make grazing land) has been taking place on Exmoor for hundreds of years and is part of what has shaped what is only a semi-natural landscape.

The water which drains off the high moors, feeds the many waterways through Exmoor including the River Exe - which wends its way across the county to find the Channel on the South Devon coast at Exmouth. It is of course this river that gave the place its name. The streams and tributaries which feed Exmoor’s rivers (there are seven others) have also helped form the landscape with deep combes and lush wooded valleys another of the characteristics of the area. It is within the woodlands and around the waterway that you are most likely to spot some of Exmoor's wildlife including red deer, bats and otters. You can find out more about the national park during a camping trip in Exmoor by heading to one of its three visitor centres in Dulverton, Dunster and Lynmouth.

Exmoor’s starry night skies

It’s not just by day that Exmoor offers great views for camping holidays. It’s equally, if not more, impressive by night. There’s nothing quite like sitting up round the campfire (or, for optimum darkness, away from the campfire) and watching the stars appear overhead. Exmoor National Park is one of the least developed parts of the south and, as such, has low levels of light pollution which means that it is a great place for stargazing. The national park authority actually hire out telescopes so people can take a look for themselves if they don’t have their own equipment and there’s an annual Dark Skies Festival in the autumn too. Particularly good places to stargaze from are said to include Holdstone Hall, County Gate and Brendon Two Gates but we’d recommend giving it a go wherever you’re camping in Exmoor - there’s nothing quite like it.

Walking on Exmoor and The South West Coast Path

If you’re hoping for a few good walks while you’re camping in Exmoor, you won’t be disappointed. The national park has hundreds of miles of public footpaths including a great stretch of the South West Coast Path. This long distance path stretches for more than 630 miles from Minehead in Somerset, just outside Exmoor National Park, all around the west coast of England taking in all of the entire coastline of Devon and Cornwall and a chunk of Dorset too. Anyone who decides to undertake the start of the route (if starting out from Minehead) soon arrives in the national park for what is arguably one of the best parts of the entire route (though there are plenty of other highlights). For people who are camping in one place and just fancy a day, or a few hours, out walking the well-signposted South West Coast Path offers an easy route to follow. A particularly good and popular section in Exmoor is from Lynton to the Valley of the Rocks where a herd of feral goats tend to delight visitors and annoy the locals.

Three towns within Exmoor, Lynton, Lynmouth and Dunster - on the Somerset side of the park, have been awarded Walkers are Welcome status which recognise the efforts made to promote walking in the area. Find out about good walking routes in the area from the national park centre in town. A popular place to walk away from the coast is at Tarr Steps. It’s an ancient bridge over the River Barle within a national nature reserve. There’s a car park nearby so if you fancy a short stroll or the longer walk to Dulverton, the choice is yours. If you prefer two wheels to your own two feet - you might like to try the Tarka Trail which takes in the west part of the national park and lots of other Devon highlights.

Places to visit in Exmoor

The twin towns of Lynton and Lynmouth are some of the best-known and best-loved destinations in Exmoor National Park. Lynton sits 450 feet above its sister Lynmouth and the two are linked by the famous cliff railway, a water-powered funicular railway. It’s a great way to travel from harbourside Lynmouth after a look around the town’s Flood Museum or little shops - and, best of all, when you get to the top you can enjoy a Devonshire cream tea with a view from the cliff top cafe. Family friendly attractions in and around Exmoor include another railway, the Lynton and Barnstaple Railway, Exmoor Zoo and Coombe Martin Wildlife and Dinosaur Park.

The towns of Dulverton, Dunster and Porlock are just some of those which are worth a visit within the national park. Dulverton is a busy hub and market town on the River Barle. Its historic buildings include its old Guildhall which now houses a small heritage centre that’s open to visitors. Medieval Dunster has yet more historic buildings including Dunster Castle which is managed by the National Trust. Little Porlock village is a nice place to stop off on a journey along the coast - but beware - it is famous for having one of the steepest hills in England! Campers in vintage campervans may want to avoid testing their brakes on it and should probably opt for the more gentle but winding toll road. There’s a little shingle beach and harbour at Porlock Weir and there’s more chance to get busy with a bucket and spade at Lynmouth beach but, if you want a day of full-on seaside fun while you’re camping in Exmoor, head for the seaside resorts of Minehead on the Somerset side of Exmoor or Watermouth Bay in Devon.

About

Go camping in beautiful Exmoor and find and inspiring place to pitch your tent with this collection of campsites in Exmoor National Park, all chosen by the authors of the best-selling Hipcamp guidebook series.