Follow the elephant

STAN CULLIMORE packs his bags for a trip with friends to Devon and finds donkeys, cows, ice cream and... and an orange elephant

- 

HERE are always a whole host of fab and fun reasons to visit Devon. It's such a pretty picturesque place, why wouldn't you want to go and spend some quality time hanging down there, enjoying the world? So much to see, so much to do, so much to relish. Makes it tricky to pick which particular part you want to try at times. And it isn't always easy to know just what to do once you get there either.

However, for my latest holiday adventure, some friends and I decided we wanted to take a trip to stay on a real live, working, actual, factual, honest-to-goodness, farm. The sort of place that might just give off faint echoes of Jeremy Clarkson's infamous, Diddly Squat TV show.

As luck would have it, there is indeed such a place. It even has a name that is just as distinctive - Orange Elephant Farm Stays. This is a selection of luxurious, self catering accommodation, snuggled down in the beating heart of a proper, family-run, dairy farm. A place filled with all the sights, sounds and smells of a genuine working farm. Perfect. So we booked in and set off.

Getting there couldn't have been easier from our Bristol home. Head down to the bottom of the M5 motorway, and just past Exeter (where motorway turns to dual carriageway) you will be greeted by the sight of a large orange, plastic elephant standing in a field, looking for all the world like it's inviting you in with its trunk. Take the hint, turn off at the next exit and a couple of minutes later you will find yourself arriving at your holiday destination, the home of the Orange Elephant.

It's a strange name for a farm, I know. I should stress, they do not breed elephants, of any colour, just dairy cows. Three hundred and fifty of them at last count. The reason for the name is simple.