Grimspound

Last day off on this trip and I walked to Grimspound, a bronze age settlement on Dartmoor. It's a well-known walk, starting from the picturesque village of Widecombe-in-the-Moor and heading up onto the moor. Today it was drifting patches of low fog interspersed by sun.

After an hour or so I was looking down from Hameldown Tor on the outline of Grimspound.

The remains of the main gate are quite impressive:

Within the remains of the wall are numerous very impressive hut circles:

Nearby, tourists rest their cameras on the rocks and walk towards them trying to look natural.

This the view looking back from Hookney Tor.

From here it's a short walk down into the valley, where the road leads back to Widdecombe. The contrast between the barren moorland and the lush, green coombe is one of the delights of Dartmoor.

To make more of a walk of it I climbed up the other side of the valley to Honeybag Tor

Near the top is a balancing rock.

From here there is a line of Tors heading back towards Widdecombe. This Honeybag Tor viewed from Chinkwell Tor.

Chinkwell Tor

From Bell Tor there is quiet lane back to Widdecombe

Lots of gorgeous buildings along this lane. This door is engraved 1682 - tempting!

A day on Dartmoor

Spending a few weeks working in the UK, fortunately in Devon where there are any number of gorgeous walks to be had. This day up on Dartmoor the weather was outstanding for November. We began by walking to a (partly fake) stone circle:



From here we walked up to about 530m (the highest point on the Moor is about 600m), had lunch sheltered from the wind behind an army hut, and ended up at Wild Tor, one of the granite outcrops that are the defining feature of this landscape. On a good day like this you can see the surrounding farmland from pretty much every point on the moor.



Crossing a stream which feeds the river Teign we circled back via Watten Tor, a particularly pretty example of the genre:


Here it is again without the annoying tourist: