Port Isaac, UK

We came here solely because of the Doc Martin TV show, wanting to experience the enchanting village of Port Isaac, (which goes by the name of Portwenn in the show.) The town is remote, and cannot be reached by bus or train, so your choices from London are either a train/bus/taxi combo OR a train/rental car option. We opted for the latter, having survived an earlier episode of driving on the “wrong side” in New Zealand. I thought it would be easy because the town where we rented the car was small (it wasn’t) and the rural road would be easy (no, with rock walls on both sides of insanely narrow lanes).

We hoped, but did not expect, to see filming of Doc Martin. The likelihood was low, because we only had a few hours in town and weather was expected to be prohibitive for filming. Imagine our excitement when we not only saw characters from the show, but actually watched the filming of a scene. In fact, Ellen is a pink blur in the background of the episode.