Where Can You Visit Former Deserts Near Devon?
You can find everything from wetlands to moors and rolling hills in and around Devon, but you might not know that this part of England was once home to desert landscapes. Where can you visit former deserts and see what’s left of them?
What Not to Expect
Before you head out to visit these sites, it’s worth remembering that you aren’t going to see sites like the current deserts dotted across the planet. We immediately think of scorching temperatures and endless sandy landscapes when we think of these places but there are deserts in virtually every part of the planet, although the claim that Dungeness in Kent could qualify as the UK’s only desert due to its low rainfall has been refuted by the Met Office.
The typical image of a desert can be seen in movies like 1958’s Ice Cold in Alex or 1962’s Lawrence of Arabia. TV shows including the recently released Dune: Prophecy show us the type of desert you won’t see in Devon. We can see more of the traditional desert images in the Sahara Riches Cash Collect Slot. This game features a desert in the background, with an oasis and palm trees. The top symbols include a veiled woman, a camel and a chest filled with gold, helping to create a mysterious desert atmosphere.
The Jurassic Coast
This World Heritage Site runs for 96 miles and includes some of the most spectacular views in Devon. It’s famous partly because of the way that coastal erosion allows us to see millions of years worth of geological history in the form of exposed rock.
Since it’s relatively easy for scientists to investigate here, they’ve discovered that parts of the Jurassic Coast have had drastically different climates and settings in the past. As well as once being a shallow tropical sea, it was marshland at one point and was even a desert once. The Jurassic Coast Trust website includes a lot of details about what visitors will find there and what fossils have been discovered by researchers in the area.
"Jurassic Coast, Devon" (CC BY 2.0) by sagesolar
The Dawlish Cliffs
The information on the Geological Society site confirms that the Dawlish Cliffs reveal that this region of the UK was a desert in the past. The cliffs were formed when sand was blown from an interior desert about 250 million years ago, forming sand dunes. Pebbles are found in the centre of many of the rocky formations, as flash floods would occasionally hit the area and drag them onto the dunes.
These different parts of Devon are easy to reach, giving locals and tourists a simple way to discover part of the region’s past that not everyone is aware of. Sea tours offer one of the best ways of seeing the Devon coast from a different vantage point as you try to understand what it must have looked like long ago.
You’re not going to find any traditional desert scenery when exploring Devon, but knowing that it was once a desert adds a new perspective and lets you discover new aspects you might never have thought about before.
