RobertBeard
Moderator
My son Philip and I have birthdays coming up so my wife and daughter organised today so we could have a day off shooting together. Monday is not necessarily a good day but South West Shooting School, near Ilfracombe, is open every day of the week with shooting allowed to start at 10:30 and on Sundays the lease requires shooting to cease at 1pm so they run their registered shoot on the second Saturday of every month because of that restriction.
The drive up from Newton Abbot took a while at 1.5 hours via the M5 to Tiverton Parkway then up the North Devon link road to Barnstaple and beyond.
On arrival we had free coffee but, at present, food is limited to Kit Kats, but there are plenty of local hostelries evidently. Bill Worsley took us around as it was a quiet day and marked our cards and gave us a few pointers when we had trouble with any targets so we shot 100 sporting targets and then adjourned for more free coffee and a Kit Kat for lunch and we decided to do another 100 targets and Bill sorted out a different 100 from those shot in the morning as they have over 80 traps and 40 shooting positions.
The site is downhill in a sparsely wooded valley and you shoot up primarily to the left but also to the right down near the bottom. We did not need wellies as the paths were mostly gravelled.
The website is a little dated at present but has good directions on how to get there http://www.southwestshooting.co.uk/index.htm
They have a more active Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/South-West-Shooting-School-138995939452184/?fref=ts
For anyone wanting to have a short break for shooting in North Devon they recommend the Ilfracombe Carlton Hotel http://www.ilfracombecarlton.co.uk which promotes shooting on their website!
There is also another clay ground nearby to add variety but that is not open on Mondays and I've not been there yet and its not a CPSA registered ground and you have to book in rather than turn up unannounced but you can shoot a 100 English Sporting there.
Cost of 100 clays is £30 and Phil and I had a very enjoyable day. My first round was not too hot at 56 but 73 on the second set of different clays pushed my PB out to 73.
The ground is shortly to change hands as its too much for Ian Cawthorne's widow to cope with and it is to be run by a clay shooting Mancunian who now lives locally and evidently has some exciting plans to invest in the ground for the future.
The drive up from Newton Abbot took a while at 1.5 hours via the M5 to Tiverton Parkway then up the North Devon link road to Barnstaple and beyond.
On arrival we had free coffee but, at present, food is limited to Kit Kats, but there are plenty of local hostelries evidently. Bill Worsley took us around as it was a quiet day and marked our cards and gave us a few pointers when we had trouble with any targets so we shot 100 sporting targets and then adjourned for more free coffee and a Kit Kat for lunch and we decided to do another 100 targets and Bill sorted out a different 100 from those shot in the morning as they have over 80 traps and 40 shooting positions.
The site is downhill in a sparsely wooded valley and you shoot up primarily to the left but also to the right down near the bottom. We did not need wellies as the paths were mostly gravelled.
The website is a little dated at present but has good directions on how to get there http://www.southwestshooting.co.uk/index.htm
They have a more active Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/South-West-Shooting-School-138995939452184/?fref=ts
For anyone wanting to have a short break for shooting in North Devon they recommend the Ilfracombe Carlton Hotel http://www.ilfracombecarlton.co.uk which promotes shooting on their website!
There is also another clay ground nearby to add variety but that is not open on Mondays and I've not been there yet and its not a CPSA registered ground and you have to book in rather than turn up unannounced but you can shoot a 100 English Sporting there.
Cost of 100 clays is £30 and Phil and I had a very enjoyable day. My first round was not too hot at 56 but 73 on the second set of different clays pushed my PB out to 73.
The ground is shortly to change hands as its too much for Ian Cawthorne's widow to cope with and it is to be run by a clay shooting Mancunian who now lives locally and evidently has some exciting plans to invest in the ground for the future.
