Shepton Mallet

Shepton Mallet is a Somerset market town whose most famous building was a prison, and whose second most famous export was a sparkling perry marketed at women who found cider too intimidating. The Romans built a road through it and kept going. It survives on cider, quarrying and the fact that everyone driving to Glastonbury has to slow down somewhere, and there is a quiet dignity in being the place people pass through on the way to their best weekend of the year.