A GROUP of gipsy families has put in a bid to buy a high profile parcel of land on the A39 between Alcombe and Dunster. The four-acre site, near to the field in which car boot sales are regularly held, is owned by retired contractor Tony Caulfield from Yarde, near Williton. He told the Free Press this week that, although he had yet to make a final decision on whether to sell the land, the offer he had received from the gipsies was high and "very good". "These are Somerset gipsies but I don't know what they want to do with the land - my only interest is in the sale of it." The site falls within the Dunster division of Somerset County Council, for which Cllr Christine Lawrence was hoping to retain her seat at yesterday's polls (Thursday). Cllr Lawrence, who also represents Minehead North on West Somerset District Council, said she was extremely concerned at the potential sale. "The site is outside the development line and is on the edge of, if not inside, the Exmoor national park," she told the Free Press. "I am doing everything I can to find out the facts in relation to what can be done with the land without planning permission and what would require permission. "But this is obviously a worry and I am seriously concerned for the community of the Minehead area." Local civic leaders are likely to be fearful that a situation similar to that at North Curry could develop, where Taunton Deane Borough Council is facing a long battle to remove a group of gipsies from land they have bought. Mr Caulfield said he had owned the site for the past eight or nine years and that it had planning approval to convert some barns into stables. He said he would have preferred to create a holiday caravan park on the land, or use it for some other tourist-related scheme. "But I have come up against a brick wall with the planners with everything I have come up with. "I'm just fed up with it. This offer will be very hard to turn down but I haven't made a definite decision yet." l Travellers caused the early closure of virtually all of Minehead's pubs on bank holiday Monday. The town's publicans, took the decision to put up the shutters several hours ahead of normal closing time after it was feared there could be trouble. Marcus Kravis of the Queens Hall said he understood that anything between a dozen and 30 motor homes had been parked up near the back of the Co-Op supermarket in The Avenue. "I heard that the York was closing early and the Hairy Dog so I followed suit," he said. "It was a precautionary measure and as it happened we didn't have any problems, but I operated a 'closed door' policy all evening until about 10pm when we decided to close completely." Mr Kravis said he understood the travellers had moved on early on Tuesday.