My parents had lived in Devon for quite a long time, and I'd been down there fairly often so I knew some places around their place and in Dartmoor that I wanted to take Josh to. It was not a particularly nice day, but the morning was just grey with no rain so we thought we'd set out and see what happened. Driving around Dartmoor meant that we weren't that far away from home should the weather get nasty.
Our first stop for the day, however, was a country supplies store called Mole Avon. Josh had brought over two pairs of trainers - one for hiking and a general pair. The hiking ones were great, but they were meant for drier places than the UK. His feet kept getting wet and because we were sleeping in a tent and it was raining for most of the trip, they never really dried out from day to day. So we stopped in so he could get a proper pair of shoes. Yes three weeks in might have been a bit late, but they proved to be quite useful even today!
The next stop was meant to be the church of Brentor but the road that Google Maps was taking us on was closed, and I didn't know of an alternative route. He wasn't too fussed on going to a church so I didn't push it. However, as we drove across a cattle grate into Dartmoor, we could see the church on its hill in the distance. We followed a couple of roads to get a bit closer to take photos.
The church itself dates from the 13th century, and was built atop Brent Tor, which means you can see it from miles around. Due to this, it was also possibly used as a beacon to warn people of approaching enemies (much like the beacons in Lord of the Rings).
We drove through beautiful Dartmoor to the parking area for Wistman's Wood. I'd been here fairly recently in the Easter holidays when the trees were only just starting to bud. They were in full leafy glory when we went there, and the cows nearby were eating the leaves of the stunted old trees! It is a really nice walk there and back to the carpark, and there weren't too many other people around. The weather held up too.
It started raining as we were driving to my next stop of the day. This was the stone circle of Scorhill which I had been to with my parents. We drove up the tiny lanes to get to the parking area nearby and got out. It was miserable weather, but there were some ponies nearby so we went to say hello. The Dartmoor ponies are quite a lot smaller than normal horses, and have coarse and fluffy hair to keep them warm on Dartmoor, which can have quite unforgiving weather. They also have little round tummies as well. So cute!
It was miserable but we'd come all this way so I led the way through the terrible weather. Honestly the visibility was so poor that for a little while there I thought we would end up being lost on Dartmoor. The ground underfoot was saturated and squelching wherever we stepped, Josh's glasses kept getting misty rain on them so he could barely see. Oh the fun! We eventually found the circle, snapped a photo, then turned around and walked back. There was no time to enjoy it. Also, this photo somehow doesn't really show the awfulness of the weather...
We decided it was time to go back to the warmth and dryness of my parents house. That night we went to the local pub for dinner!