My Dartmoor Walks: February 2012

Wednesday 29th February Birch Tor

Very cool in the small car park at Bennett Cross. Down to the old tin mine workings at Vitifer Mine and Golden Dagger Mine. These were operational from 1860 to 1914. There are many old gullies and girts. In the remains of one of the old cottage is this cross. Placed in memory of Beatrice Warn who died in October 2010. She was born in 1913 and lived her childhood in the cottage.

Further along the path are the remains of this old buddle which was used to extract the tin.

Then out onto Challacombe Down to follow the path around to the Medieval Village of Challacombe and then back towards Headland Warren Farm....

....to see if the the monkey puzzle tree referred to in Hemery's book (published in 1937 was still there). First we found this relatively new monkey puzzle tree and then we saw the original.

From here we took an indirect route up through the heather to Birch Tor (61) before returning to the cars and the Warren House Inn.

Walking Irving, Mike, Keith, Sue, Liz, Jon, Pete, Ann

Tuesday 21st February Clearbrook

Colin planned this walk expecting the weather was going to be very wet so we stayed fairly low starting from Clearbrook and along the footpath from the bridge. As it turned out it was just one of those grey days.

Past a very friendly horse.

Towards the various working near the Dewerstone. Some reconstruction work on a tunnel going under the tramway. The two workers were fast asleep in their van!

This cutting was originally for horse drawn trams.

To the bridge by Shaugh Prior...

...next to the Clay Drying Kilns built in the 1880's where china clay slurry was dried out before being transferred to the railway by branch line at Shaugh Platform.

The clay slurry was brought to the Kilns by this pipeline from the china clay workings at Cadover Bridge. We followed the pipeline through the woods for about 2 miles to Cadover Bridge.

Then over Wigford Down - the view looking back to Hen Tor and Trowlesworthy Tors...

...to the Cairn at the top...

...and past the locals.

Holly who has mastered the art of walking over the cattle grid - but then they are only meant to stop the sheep and cattle - not clever dogs!

Back to The Skylark at Clearbrook where Bud and Brian were waiting having been on their own walk along the cycle track.

On the walk today Colin, Amber, Charlie and Linda.

And we didn't go over one single tor!

Monday 20th February Sheeps Tor

This walk is really a continuation of the walk on Friday 17th February and includes the tors I didn't have time to visit then. I parked by the main dam at Burrator reservoir and walked across.

As the road turns sharply to the left Burra Tor - or Berra Tor - (57) is just through the woods to the right. I hadn't notice this tor before probably because I have been concentrating on the bend in the road!

Viewed from the other side...

...and the top part of it.

As Terry Bound in his book says this tor would be most prominent overlooking the dam and the reservoir if it wasn't for the trees. On through the trees...

...with a view across to Sheeps Tor

Next to Maiden Tor (58), on the way up to Sheeps Tor...

...viewed from the other side

Around the back of Sheeps Tor (59) where students from the Duchy College were having fun.

Across to Yennadon Down...

...Sharpitor, Leather Tor and Great Mis Tor in the distance...

...and the multiple stone cirles where we stopped for our coffee break last wednesday.

From here I went down lower in search of Narrow Tor - which is a small tor somewhere between Sheeps Tor and the Arboretum but I couldn't find it. I returned through the drovers road...

..to the reservoir. Whilst from a distance this now looks full you can see that it is about three feet lower than it should be and that represents a shortfall of some millions of gallons. This might be significant in 6 months time...

...but it won't bother the ducks!

Back dam and along the road to Claig Tor (60) which sits on top of the quarry used to build the dam and much of the tor has obviously been removed - they didn't care in those days..

...but the top is still intact. Although on inspection it doesn't look authentic - it looks like it has been remodelled after the quarry work about 100 years ago.

Sunday 19th February Polruan

It's my birthday so just to make it special we went for a walk - but not on Dartmoor - the cornish coast near Polruan. A white frost first thing, then lots of blue sky and a cool gentle breeze making perfect conditions for walking.

We parked in a national trust car park about 2 miles east of Polruan and followed the footpath...