page_title: Clevedon
section_title: Geography
hierarchical_section_title: Clevedon / Geography
caption_attribution_description: English: Clevedon - Salthouse Fields Train.
context_page_description: Clevedon is an English town and civil parish in the unitary authority of North Somerset, which covers part of the ceremonial county of Somerset. It recorded a population of 21,281 in the United Kingdom Census 2011. It lies along the Severn estuary, among a group of small hills that include Church Hill, Wain's Hill, Dial Hill, Strawberry Hill, Castle Hill, Hangstone Hill and Court Hill, a Site of Special Scientific Interest. It features in the Domesday Book of 1086. Clevedon grew in the Victorian period as a seaside resort and in the 20th century as a dormitory town.
context_section_description: Clevedon is situated on and round seven hills called Church Hill, Wain's Hill (topped by the remains of an Iron Age hill fort), Dial Hill, Strawberry Hill, Castle Hill, Hangstone hill and Court Hill, the last a Site of Special Scientific Interest. On a clear day there are far-reaching views across the Severn estuary to Wales. When visibility is good, the islands of Steep Holm and Flat Holm in the Bristol Channel can be seen. The tidal rise and fall in the Severn Estuary and Bristol Channel can be as great as 14.5 m (48 ft), second only to Bay of Fundy in Eastern Canada.
  The seafront runs about half a mile from the pier to Salthouse Field, with ornamental gardens, a Victorian bandstand, a bowling green, tennis courts, crazy golf and other amusements. Marine Lake, once a Victorian swimming pool, is used for boating and for a small festival once a year where people can try out new sports. Salthouse Field has a light railway round its perimeter and is used for summer donkey rides.
  The shore at Clevedon is a mixture of pebbled beaches and low rocky cliffs, with the old harbour at the western edge of the town at the mouth of the Land Yeo river. It is remembered as the place where John Ashley conceived of the idea for The Mission to Seafarers. The rocky beach has been designated as the Clevedon Shore geological Site of Special Scientific Interest. It is the side of a mineralised fault running east–west adjacent to the pier and forms a small cliff feature in Dolomitic Conglomerate on the north side of Clevedon Beach, containing cream to pink baryte along with sulphides. Minerals identified include haematite, chalcopyrite, tennantite, galena, tetrahedrite, bornite, pyrite, marcasite, enargite and sphalerite. Secondary alteration of this has produced idaite, Covellite and other Copper sulphides.
  "Poets' Walk" is a footpath round Wain's Hill and Church Hill to the south-west of the seafront. The upper part of town contains many other footpaths through parks and wooded areas laid out in the 19th century. The name recalls poets and writers who visited Clevedon, including Coleridge in 1795 and Tennyson in 1834. The local nature reserve covers Church Hill and Wain's Hill and includes calcareous grassland, coastal scrub and woodland.
caption: Salthouse Fields
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