Exmouth: Difference between revisions

The National Coastwatch Institution Tower on the seafront has been a familiar feature of the Exmouth beach skyline in family photos and postcards for over 100 years. The red brick building was completed and opened in 1896 as a race observation tower for the then Exmouth Yacht Club, offering enviable views on race days along the beach and toward the estuary mouth. Since then it has changed hands over the course of the 20th century and had many and varied uses including a bathing house, a private home and in 1935 it became a convalescent home as a part of the Princess Elizabeth Orthopaedic Hospital. It was requisitioned in the 40’s and served as a part of the war effort as a defence lookout station watching over our coastline and in peacetime it was reopened as the Harbour View Café (summer 1946) as which it has been trading ever since. Its lookout days did not end during the war however, since 1998 it has been staffed by the National Coastwatch Institute volunteers, keeping an eye on our coast alongside the Coastguard and RNLI. As one of over 50 stations around the UK coast they act as eyes and ears, monitoring the coastline and radio channels on alert for anyone in difficulty and any hazards in the waters. A rusty pole of unknown origins in the Maer nature reserve is also a very popular landmark amongst the locals, due to its strangeness and mystery.