A Dartmoor day and Shavercombe

 A glorious day for a walk on Dartmoor. Starting and ending at the well known ‘honeypot’ of Cadover Bridge. A bit of warm weather and the Janners stream out from Plymouth to picnic, swim in the Plym and enjoy the sun. The crowds can be a little off-putting but, walk a few yards from the parking areas, they disappear.

A little longer than anticipated, the walk ended up being 8.7 miles. The route was quite straightforward - up the south bank of the Plym and back along the north bank. But that simple description doesn’t do credit to the scenery and the history we walked through.

The River Plym, our companion for almost all of the walk. For most of its length in these parts, it has been subject to many diversions as the old tin miners used the flowing waters to wash unwanted ‘overlode’ away to reveal the metal-bearing rocks they were interested in. There is lots of evidence of these activities along our entire route and one can’t help wondering what the river bed would have looked like without this human intervention.

Yes, there is a path there somewhere. Good walking practice at this time of year is always to check your body for ticks if you’ve walked through areas of ferns. There seems to be a lot of the little buggers around this year.

What better spot for our mid-morning stop for tea and/or coffee? Not something that we can usually do.

Looking across the Plym to Ditsworthy Warren, one of the last places on Dartmoor to actively farm rabbits. It was a farm until around 1947 and is now used occasionally by the army for troops on manoeuvres. It featured in the film ‘War Horse’ and has gained a certain notoriety because of this. 

Looking slightly to the east of Didsworthy Warren, the bulk of Sheepstor is visible and the Tor with the point to the right is Sharpitor, which rises above Burrator reservoir. For most of the year, walking straight ahead from this point would result in wet feet as the valley bottom is somewhat boggy.

A Wheatear, looking quite plump, which is good as it will soon be migrating to overwinter in Central Africa.

The Shavercombe Brook waterfall at the top of the eponymous combe. A great place to stop for lunch as it is one of those spots with a ‘special indescribable feeling’. 

Looking back into Shavercombe. It’s a unique spot on Dartmoor and, despite being clearly marked on maps, it is actually quite difficult to locate. Maybe that’s why it’s relatively unvisited.

The Plym looking rather underwhelming after all the recent dry weather. At this point, it is usually impossible to cross without wading through a thigh-deep torrent. Not to be attempted by the sensible and certainly not by a rather ungainly septuagenarian. Septuagenarian? Gosh, that’s a sobering thought.

Some of our group standing next to the largest monolith/menhir in the early Bronze Age Drizzlecombe complex. It's about 15 feet high and is a hefty chunk of granite. Cairns, cists, stone rows, hut circles, monoliths - this area has them all. Of course, back when they were first erected, it is highly likely that the area was still afforested and they were built in clearing or, perhaps, on the edge of the trees. For anyone tempted to visit Drizzlecombe, be aware that access can be very boggy for most of the year and the route would have to be chosen carefully. Mrs P and I have tried to reach them several times from the Didsworthy Warren direction and have given up when faced with having to leap streams and wade through sphagnum bogs. Approaching from the north via the Eylesbarrow Mine area is probably the best bet when the conditions are against you and you want to keep your feet dry.

Two shots of the largest stone row at Drizzlecombe. No-one really knows what they were built for and the usual tropes are 'ceremonial' or 'processional'. Who knows? But it's always struck me that, for the typical double stone row, the space between the stones is rather narrow. So, the procession must have been in single file only! Whatever the reasons, it clearly took purpose, organisation and leadership to build these rows and were not insignificant undertakings.

We are looking here from Didsworthy Warren across the Plym to the slopes of Hen Tor. There are markings of the boundaries of a medieval field system but also, if you look closely, two elongated mounds. These are the remains of the rabbit warrens that the warriners of Ditsworthy looked after. The rocky terrain of Dartmoor is not the natural habitat for rabbits so we don’t see them as often as you might expect. There are hares around as well and they are even rarer to see.

Ditsworthy Warren house. It dates from the early 1800s and is a good spot to include in a circular walk. In the winter months, when the leaves are off the trees, it can look pretty bleak.

And this is what a little post-editing in Photoshop can do. Certainly makes for a more dramatic shot but not particularly realistic. A few tweaks and the blue sky becomes quite menacing.

The Plym, again, with the Warren in the distance. Someone has taken the effort to build a small dam, maybe to hold enough water back to make a paddling pool. Once the river is back in full spate, the stones will be washed away. Which is a good thing because such obstacles can stop small fish migrating up to the headwaters of the river to spawn.

Little Trowlesworthy Tor to the left and Great Trowleswothy Tor to the right. Well worth visiting for the remains of quarries, worked pink granite and the plethora of archaeological artefacts covering a couple of millennia. But not today!

Walking back along the north bank of the Plym. Can you spot Mrs P pushing her way through the ferns? Give it another two or three weeks and the ferns will be turning brown and dying back. The path becomes more obvious when this happens and remains so until the new growth starts next year.

The sound of the gentle tinkling of the Shavercombe Brook. Close your eyes and imagine that you are sitting nearby and this is the only sound you can hear.

Or, perhaps, the accompanying mewing of buzzards circling above. It’s the time of year when the parents  stop feeding the young and they have to start fending for themselves. I think it takes a while for the young to accept the new reality of independent living. Does that sound familiar?