Dartmoor CAM

This walk: 2009-2-12. Bennet's Cross, Birch Tor, Vitifer Mine area, enclosure, Headland Warren Farm, pound, Two Moors Way, shelter/hut, Warren House Inn.

This walk was different because of the snow. While it was a few days since the last fall and much of the moor was now more or less clear of snow, this area was not. The snow was hard to start with and we could walk on the surface, breaking through occasionally up to the knees. Later, we broke through much more as the day warmed.

Walk details below - Information about the route etc.

View from Kings Oven car park to the Warren House Inn, in the remnants of the snow.

This sheep was not moving for anything .....

..... she must have found a good salt-lick from the gritting of the road.

The old crooked cross - Bennets Cross.

Looking up to Birch Tor, SX 686 814.

Walking down into the Vitifer Mine complex.

A view that caught the eye .....

Part of an old mine building.

Looking towards the corner of the enclosure at SX 68370 80891 - a waypoint on the blue route on the map below.

A cloer view of the enclosure corner, showing the track that runs beside it up the slope.

Some of the large stones used in building the wall - them's lumpy!

A view of half-melted, wind-blown snow drift.

Looking south, an interesting sky.

Soussons Wood, SX 680 800 (general area).

Our footprints in the snow - an award-winning photograph?!

Looking down on Headland Warren Farm.

Birch Tor again.

Looking up the track where no-one had gone before us - the snow was knee-deep and walking became quite difficult.

Approaching the pound, after the farm, at SX 69343 81301.

Seen on the side of the road at SX 69538 81386 in the small car park. I'm not sure if this is a man-made snow sculpture or, more likely, something that fell off the snow plough?

The sculpted snow at the side of the small road - obviously made by a snow plough.

A view of the seemingly endless track going up over the slopes of Birch Tor, along a section of the Two Moors Way.

A shelter of some sort at SX 578570 81814 � 5 meters.

..... another view.

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Looking east along the B3212
panning right to Warren House Inn.
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Walk details

MAP: Blue = planned route, Red = GPS satellite track of the actual walk.

The blue lines are the compass or GPS bearings. The red line is the route actually walked: it deviates sometimes from the blue lines to avoid obstacles such as thick bracken, gorse, bogs or clitter, and often to use paths or animal tracks that are not on the map. It may also be shorter than the planned (blue) route if the walk is curtailed for some reason.

Reproduced from Dartmoor OS Explorer map 1:25 000 scale by permission of Ordnance Survey
on behalf of The Controller of Her Majesty's Stationery Office.
© Crown copyright. All rights reserved. Licence number 100047373.
Also, Copyright © 2005, Memory-Map Europe, with permission

Access to this walk was simple - on the B3212, park at the Bennet's Cross car park, 1 km / 1,000 yards past the Warren House Inn when travelling from Plymouth direction, i.e. on the Moretonhampstead side. We actually had to park at the King's Oven car park nearer to the pub because the park at Bennet's Cross was full of snow.

Statistics
Distance - 6.6 km / 4.2 miles.
Start 10.30 am, Finish 1.55 pm, Duration 3 hr 25 min.
Moving average 2.9 kph / 1.8 mph; Overall average 2 kph / 1.24 mph.