Southcott Farm Cottage

Diggerland is a theme park where children and adults can ride, drive and operate real diggers, dumpers and other full-size construction machinery. The Devon park is in Cullompton, and the whole line-up runs to around 20 rides and drives.

Tip: Check the ride height chart on the Diggerland website before you go, so you know which rides each child can enjoy.

Exeter Cathedral has stood at the heart of Devon for nearly a thousand years. Its Norman towers and Decorated Gothic interior are topped by the longest uninterrupted medieval stone vaulted ceiling in the world. Inside you can see the 15th-century Astronomical Clock and an early set of misericords, and guided floor tours and audio guides help bring the building to life.

Tip: Head for the Treasures Exhibition tour or a guided floor tour, both included in standard admission, though floor tours are subject to availability.

Coldharbour Mill in Uffculme is one of the oldest woollen mills in the UK, and has been in continuous production since 1797. Once owned by the Fox Brothers textile firm, it is now a working wool museum set across 12 acres of Victorian mill buildings, boilers, steam engines and grounds. Historic England has called it "probably one of the best-preserved textile mill complexes in the country".

Tip: Check the mill's website for current opening days and any event days or workshops before you go.

Killerton is an 18th-century house near Exeter, cared for by the National Trust and shown as a comfortable family home. Inside, period rooms display a collection of 18th- to 20th-century costumes, and there is a fashion exhibition on the first floor.

Tip: Dogs on short leads are welcome everywhere outside and in the Stables Coffee Shop, but only assistance dogs are allowed in the house and the Kitchen Café.

Tropiquaria is a small zoo and animal sanctuary based in and around a repurposed 1933 BBC Radio Transmitting Station at Washford Cross in Somerset. The listed building houses the Reptile House, Aquarium and Nocturnal House, with several acres of outdoor enclosures around it. Outside you can spot animals such as gibbons, ring-tailed lemurs, meerkats, tapir, wallabies and serval.

Tip: Don't leave dogs in your vehicle, as the car park has limited shade; only registered Assistance Dogs are allowed in the zoo.

Powderham Castle is a fortified manor house six miles south of Exeter, on flat ground beside the Exe estuary. The medieval core dates from after 1390, and the house was extended and altered in the 18th and 19th centuries. It has been home to the Courtenay family, Earls of Devon, for centuries.

Tip: The main public entrance gates are in the village of Kenton, so head there rather than to the castle's other side.

Otterton Mill is a working watermill beside the River Otter, near Budleigh Salterton. A mill has stood here since the Domesday Book, and the old workings are free to look round, with a self-guided tour and the water wheel kept turning. Flour is still milled using traditional methods.

Tip: Well-behaved dogs on leads can sit outside or downstairs in the café, but only assistance dogs are allowed in the farm shop, gallery and upstairs café.

Cothay Manor is a Grade I listed medieval house near Wellington in Somerset, built around 1480. Its period rooms include a great hall with a hammer-beam roof, and the house has a chapel, a gatehouse and mullioned windows. Writing in Country Life in 1927, Christopher Hussey called it "the most perfect small 15th-century country house that survives in the Kingdom".