Welcome to North Devon. Is that snow on your boots?

The holiday season in North Devon is well and truly under way. Already the roads are more congested and the beaches are busier. This despite the frankly disappointing weather. I was at Westward Ho! walking the dog late this afternoon. The tide was well up so we walked along one side of the Pebbleridge and back over the golf course. Just as we got near the Northam Burrows visitors' centre we encountered a small group of what I think could have been Russians or maybe Poles. It was the area where my fellow dog owners disgrace themselves by failing to clear up after their pets. The truth is these people can drive close to this building, let their dog out, which then craps everywhere, before driving off again with dog shoved in the back of the car.

And so it was I met a little group of Eastern European tourists who were obviously having a nice time. One rather corpulent gent in a tight white T-shirt sat on a hummock while one of his female companions used her camera to capture the scene for posterity. It would be some while before I chose that spot as the most picturesque place in North Devon for holiday snaps. Yet despite this, the group were all happy, they were having a nice time. What did it matter what I, as a local, thought of their choice of location? Maybe whatever locality they were used to was an absolute dump, fully of rusty cars, dog excrement and buildings with concrete cancer.

That's the thing with tourism. It is frequently touted as the most important element in the North Devon economy, which is something I have trouble agreeing with. It ought to be cream on our cake, not the cake itself. Well, that's what I think. However, the fact remains that many people gain considerable enjoyment from coming to our beautiful coast and countryside, and who are we to deny them? In Victoria Park in Bideford is a bench with a memorial plaque dedicated to a couple from Reading and more recently of Bideford, who spent "many happy hours" in the park.

I always find it quite moving. Here was a couple for whom the simple pleasure of sitting in the park - who knows maybe with a Hockings ice cream - was enough. And so I welcome our Russian/Polish/Latvian/Lithuanian/who knows visitors. For, whether they know it or not, life is short and we should all take our pleasures where we can. The simple pleasures of the park may be all we have time for, so do not delay. Putting off today for what we might get tomorrow could simply be a recipe for achieving nothing at all. And that would be very sad.