Short answer: The harbour, Verity, the chapel walk and the beaches are all free, and parking here is genuinely cheaper than the beach villages. The museum is a low-cost indoor option. Annie and the Flint does the best coffee in town at sensible prices, and the Harbour Café at Combe Martin does cooked breakfasts around the £9 mark.
This is not a small thing. Reviewers consistently describe Ilfracombe's parking as reasonably priced and the food as good value compared with Woolacombe or Salcombe. If the budget is fifty pounds for a family, this is the town where it stretches furthest.
The harbour is the most-reviewed thing in Ilfracombe and it costs nothing — Verity on the pier, boats coming and going, the independent shops, and the walk up to the chapel on the hill above for the view back over the bay. Budget an hour or two just for that.
The beaches are free too. Ilfracombe Beach below the seafront has parking right alongside, Wildersmouth is directly in front of the town, and Harbour Beach appears beside the quay at low tide. Rapparee Cove east of the harbour is the best swimming spot and costs nothing to reach.
Ilfracombe Museum near the seafront is inexpensive — a cheerfully overstuffed Victorian collection with taxidermy, local history and film of the old Barnstaple railway line, plus scavenger-hunt sheets that keep children moving. Closed Mondays and Sundays. It is a fraction of the aquarium's price if the budget is tight.
Annie and the Flint at the top of the high street does the best coffee in Ilfracombe with big cakes and steak ciabattas, and is cheap by seaside-town standards. The Harbour Café at Combe Martin, ten minutes east, does cooked breakfasts around £9 with no extra charge for a pot of tea — and it is the highest-rated café on this coast.
The Pier Tavern on the quay does fish landed locally with batter made in house at pub prices rather than restaurant ones.
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