Short answer: Totnes Museum is free, packed, and housed in a genuinely remarkable Elizabethan building. The High Street is a full street of independent shops to duck between. Woodlands Family Theme Park is twenty minutes away with large indoor play areas.
Totnes is eight miles inland at the tidal head of the Dart, which means rain does not ruin it the way it ruins a coastal village. It is the alternative-minded market town of south Devon and the shopping is the point.
Totnes Museum and Archives is a packed local museum in a genuinely remarkable Elizabethan building on the High Street, and it costs nothing. An hour, comfortably, and more if the building itself interests you.
A full street of independent shops running uphill from the Plains to the castle — bookshops, delis, whole-food places, second-hand everything. On a wet day the point is that you can duck in and out of them, which is more than most Devon high streets offer.
Totnes Castle is a classic Norman motte and bailey at the top of the town with the best view over Totnes from the keep. There is no shelter and no toilets on site, so it is a twenty-minute thing between showers rather than a wet-day destination. Dogs on leads are welcome and there is a dog bowl by the entrance.
Bruto Lounge on the Plains is a comfortable all-day café bar with a careful allergy approach. The Waterside Bistro is right by the river with a patio, open ten till ten. The Steam Packet Inn is riverside on St Peter's Quay. The Pig & Whistle at Littlehempston is an old beamed country pub just outside town and the best of the lot.
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