'DULVERTON, oh Dulverton'

You should sing it as if you were Glen Campbell singing Galveston.

The Somerset town is lovely, boasting quaint, narrow streets and a market square, surrounded by rolling green hills and woodland.

It is on the edge of Exmoor, which for those who don't get up there very much, is Dartmoor's altogether smoother and more rounded cousin.

Dartmoor is rough and spiky and has bits sticking out of it that hurt your shins. Exmoor wears a waxed jacket and says 'Helllooooo...' like Leslie Phillips.

It is, therefore, maybe not the best place in the world in which to declare yourself a non-shooting, non-fishing, non-hare-coursing, Guardian-reading, anti-hunting, tree-embracing pinko liberal vegetarian.

And lovely though Woods Bar is, and delicious though its beautifully-kept Dartmoor IPA might be, its decorations made me a touch uncomfortable to say the least.

The last newspaper columnist to have a pop at the town and its people — in a national newspaper someone called Liz Jones upset shopkeepers and said it was a bonus if any of the men in the West Country had any teeth — ended up with shotgun pellet holes in her letterbox.

In an effort to avoid the same fate, because Reg the Jack Russell often loiters near the letter box waiting for someone to come home and play with him, and wouldn't take kindly to it, I should point out that the people of Dulverton could not have been friendlier.

And as far as I could see they appeared to be in full possession of all their teeth.

It's just that their approach to their local wildlife was, shall we say, somewhat at odds with mine.

Our visit to the little Somerset town came at the end of a day chasing men in Lycra across the countryside.

The Tour of Britain cycle race came west from Frome to finish in Bideford.

Then, the following day, it went back east again from Hatherleigh to Yeovil.

I like cycling. It is currently a sport almost free of taint in a world of diving football millionaires, rigged Grand Prix motor races and rugby players biting blood capsules.

Cycling has battled its own cheats and seems — touch wood — to be emerging from the long, dark tunnel.

The sun beat down on Exmoor on the day we were there. Over the farm gate the sheep were bleating happily, clearly oblivious to the fact that they were in a part of the country probably least conducive to the health and longevity of edible animals.

The hills tumbled down to the Somerset Levels and somewhere out across the murky brown water beyond the nuclear power station you could see the sun glinting off the glass of a building in Cardiff.

But the signs of a very different lifestyle were there already.

In the near distance you could hear the crump-crump of 12-bore shotguns being unleashed in the direction of something airborne.

Given the fact that it is not yet the season to be shooting at fleeing birds, I can only assume they were shooting at clay pigeons.

A few seconds later another crump-crump. Then another, and another.

Somewhere behind the little wood on the top of the hill the well-heeled were paying handsomely for the privilege of warming up their trigger fingers in preparation for the killing things season.

How many clays were downed or winged in those few minutes I can only imagine, but the skies over Exmoor must have been thick with flying 12-gauge shot.

Then some police motorcyclists roared up the hill at high speed, their blue strobe lights flashing, and a chap drove past with a loudspeaker, thanking us for coming out to the roadside and telling us what was going on in the cycle race.

He didn't mention the shotgun carnage unfolding in the fields.

Five bicycle riders went by, including the brave Belgian Thomas de Ghendt and the wily Welshman Geraint Thomas. We recognised those two, but the others were gone before we could get their numbers.

Then the peloton flashed by in a whirl of wheels and brightly-coloured Lycra, and a van with a broom tied to the back doors, signifying the sweeper at the back of the field, signified the fact that the Tour of Britain had gone by.

We dashed back to Tommo's car and started a zig-zag dash through the lanes to another junction somewhere else on Exmoor, where the presence of a police roadblock and a gaggle of brightly-dressed cycle fans pointed to the fact that we were back on the route.

Sure enough, moments later the police motorbikes roared and strobed by again, quickly followed by the still-grateful commentary man and the still-leading breakaway five, who had held on to their advantage over the climb of big, bad Winsford Hill.

A little over a minute later the peloton went by again, flashing faster this time and with the Columbia-HTC team of race leader Edvald Boasen Hagen in determined mood on the front.

Half an hour later, out of our sight and just before the finish in Bideford, they hunted down the breakaway five and Boasen Hagen was first across the line.

By then, Tommo, Richard the ace peloton photographer and I had got back into the car and headed back down big, bad Winsford Hill, making for Dulverton and some long overdue refreshment.

My two companions — meat-eaters both — had visited Woods Bar before, making it a refreshment stop on some crazy 100-mile bike slog around Exmoor.

We parked the car right in front of the window of the local butcher, a window laden with shiny cuts taken from the carcasses of slain animals, and picked our way through the four-by-fours.

Inside the bar the walls were decorated with the stuffed heads of various creatures including a hare, a badger and a fox, with the long-distant dates of death inscribed on shields.

The glass-eyed dead animals had rolled-up banknotes tucked into their ears and behind their teeth for reasons I couldn't fathom and frankly didn't like to ask.

I would have, honestly, but I had an irrational and completely unfounded suspicion that the last Guardian-reading townie veggie who asked that question was hidden in among the shiny brisket and silverside in the butcher's window.

On the opposite wall the antlers of various other animals were displayed, mounted on shiny off-white bits of skull.

This is the traditional home of the Exmoor Hunt, after all.

The beer was good, though, and the landlord very welcoming.

He even threw in a free gift as the three of us picked up our lunchtime pints and peanuts from the bar.

"Have these on the house, gentlemen," he said, kindly.

It was a free and gratis bag of his favourite pork scratchings.

Cheers, then.