A Visit to Dartmoor

I've always been intrigued with the moors in the West Country but wasn't sure how I could do some exploring there without a car but managed to with the marvel of the English buses and hitch hiking.  A couple buses from Tintagel and I was at Princetown in the middle of the Moor.  Princetown is famous for it's prison and where Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote The Hound of the Baskervilles.  I little history lesson:  this is where the British took over 12,000 US prisoners during The War of 1812.  I knew nothing except the name, The War of 1812, and 'lo and behold' it was mainly a war of commercial interests with some of the battles being fought in Michigan at Detroit and Macinaw as well as New Orleans and other places..  Supposedly the English hadn't accepted the US was it's own country at that time and treated the prisoners not very well as traitors.  A surprise to me having grown up in Detroit and never knowing this.

North Hersary Tor with a burial cairn from the bronze age.

Over 3,500 years old

Another view of North Hersary Tor

Wild Ponies in the morning fog. Their have been ponies sold
at the pony market in Princetown for 100's of years with ponies being sold for almost nothing.
The last sale was in the early 1950's

Nuns Cross in the upper right corner from the 13th Century
that marked the boundary between the Forest of Dartmoor and Buckland Abbey

Ancient stone bridge at Postbridge.  Three long flat stones for the top.  Amazing to see.

The Moor was the 1st place I tried hitch-hiking since the train/bus systems were so good and what I wanted to see was usually close to the villages I was able to get to them.  But the Moor was different with only 1 bus in and out of Princetown and none between the Villages.  So I gave Hitch-hiking a try to get to Postbridge and it worked beautifully there and back.  With success under my belt I decided to give Widecome-in-the-Moor a try with all my luggage.  This was a longshot because of no direct route  but the 2nd vehicle stopped and asked where I was going and the young man said, "that's where I'm going, my parents live there and I'll give you a ride."  Still hard to believe but true and I had this most beautiful  drive on these very narrow country roads between the hedge rows. Widecome-in-the-Moore is one of the most picturesque villages but with no bus service from anywhere, to my surprise, and being Friday no rooms available.  So after a lunch and a lovely visit  I tried hitching again, not sure to where, and immediately got a ride to Bovey Tracy where there is bus service and I was on my way to Glastonbury for a long weekend.