A first for me - walking in a familiar area of West Dartmoor, but this time setting off in the evening, setting up a tarp as an overnight shelter and walking back in the morning. Of course, we didn’t exactly mean to set off in the evening, but a certain amount of shopping was necessary, and apparently it is harder to choose the perfect camping gas cooker than you might think…
So we parked at Barn Hill at around 7pm, and set off south towards Pew Tour. The sun was just dipping towards the horizon as we commenced our walk, gradually painting the sky in pinks and blues as we travelled. This was not a long walk, heading first over Barn Hill to Windy Post, a medieval stone cross which marks the crossing point of the Abbott’s Way and the Grimstone and Sortridge Leat.
Crossing over the Leat we then bore leftward and headed on toward Feather Tor. By the time we got there dusk was becoming significantly more advanced, and the gathering gloom evidenced that we were fast running out of light.
However, we were very close to our camping area. We headed back downhill towards the Pew Tor Cottage branch of the Leat, crossing over on a slab bridge. It grew increasingly dark as we made our way around the eastern side of Pew Tor, and the latter stages of our journey involved head torches, pushing our way through head high bracken, and some head scratching over the map. We finally found a small area to camp next to the Leat, around 200 metres east of Pew. At last, time to set up camp, cook up some sausages and lie down and gaze up at the stars.
Camping was… different. There were a number of issues, predominantly down to not having chosen the right kit. We set up a tarp using my hiking poles and some guy ropes. I had bought a 3m tarp, but it was too big for the space we were in, and to be honest significantly bigger than we needed. The way we erected it let it flap noisily all night, as well as letting lots of breeze whistle under the side.
This wouldn’t have mattered so much - but I also had bought a lightweight hiking sleeping bag. This had two drawbacks - the first was that although the sleeping bag was advertised at 1-2 seasons, I suspect that was for use inside a tent. With just a tarp, it was not really warm enough. Not to mention, it wasn’t designed for someone of my body shape. I, um, couldn’t quite do it up when I was inside. So that didn’t help either. But since I had a cardigan and a coat to drape over the gap it wasn’t the end of the world. I did get some sleep. The others, however, were concerned they heard wild animals growling and snorting in the shelter. I didn’t hear anything though. They must have been imagining things.
Morning finally dawned with that kind of chill you only feel after a night of not enough sleep on the hard ground, punctuated only by efforts to prevent yourself sliding off your sleeping mat. We rose with the sun, and packed our belongings away, with our campsite cleared away shortly after the sun had fully got his hat on.
Then it was time for the short walk back to Barn Hill, via the tops of Heckwood Tor and Feather Tor, and home for a bacon sarnie.
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