Dartmoor, Devon 2

While enjoying Ashburton yesterday we found the Tourist Information Centre.  We struck up a lovely conversation with the main man, and he explained where we went wrong on that fateful morning's walk.  But no problems, he sold me a couple more maps and ideas for more walks according to our tastes.

He was very helpful doing his job advising dumb tourists like me.

By the way, when preparing for this trip, we expected the weather to be cold and wet.  It's England after all.  But to date, we were enjoing the opposite.  I think the worst day got down to about 20 - and that was while we were in London.

Well all that nice weather came to an end. Today was a very different story:


But no way was a bit of bad weather going to stop us enjoying today's walk. This was another one of our hotellier's recommendations.  


This walk was simpler to navgate.  It started at a place called Fingle Bridge where we would walk to Castle Drogo, and then walk back on the other side of the river - doing a lovely circular 7Km walk.  What could go wrong this time?

Well... I take full responsibility for today's stuff up.

You all know how much I like castles, and when I asked Dr Google to direct me to Fingle Bridge I still had Castle Drogo in my head.

Oh well... We started at Castle Drogo and walked to Fingle Bridge and then back again doing exactly the loop, but just with a Julian adjustment.


And it was a success. The best part is that there's a nice little pub at Fingle Bridge.  Perfect place to have lunch half way round.


The river walk was just idyllic.  Clearly we're in a wet area - lots of moss as you can see.

Great for this little friend we made:

Further along was another two-legged creature waving sticks at the water:

On closer examination there was a fine string attached to the stick with not much more than what looked like a fly on the end of the string. 

Whatever!

These guys were enjoying life too - just sitting up there taking it all in:


OMG... the next photo shows Castle Drogo in the top right hand corner.  We made it back to our car without incident.

Oh yes, how I love to tell you that.

But the fairy tale ended there...

We decided to follow the Ashburton Tourist Information Centre's recommendation for a 7km, 2 to 3 hour walk next day at a place called Haytor.  

This walk was supposed to be another 7Km walk - 3.5Km out to Hound Tor, and then similar distance back to our car doing another circular loop.  What could go wrong?

Here's Haytor Rocks - not far from where we parked our car.


Even school kids came here to enjoy the sight of the moors:

We walked past an old quarry

With nice outlooks and grazing wild horses.  There were villages here pre Roman times.


The moss had a very calming effect

And eventually we got to Hound Tor.  

Lunch here gave us time to recover and enjoy the views.  But eventually we set off back to complete the loop.

Dr Google plus the Tourist Bureau's map had it all there - until a sequence of unforseen problems surfaced.

1) The mobile phone with the British SIM card was losing battery power very quickly.  Maybe the heat?  I can't explain it, but not even half way back I could see the percentage battery number getting smaller and smaller. Then it all went black.

2) No problems.  I had a portable battery in case the phone battery ran out.  But oh no... for the one and only time on our holiday, I had left my bum bag with the spare battery back in the hotel room.

3) No problems. I had my spare phone with the Aussie SIM card.  For $5, Optus provides access to everything as if I was at home.  I turn that on, but... no mobile reception to load up Dr Google Maps.

4) Oh well, surely we'll find our way back to the car from where we were.  It can't be that far. So we walk on, winging it, but the tracks we found wouldn't go in the right direction.

Ahhhhh!

So now it's after 4pm and the mind is imagining being unable to find a way out of here.  Nobody even knows we went here - we didn't tell the hotelliers.  We're all alone.

Panic begins to set in.

No phone, no map, not happy.

We eventually found a deserted farm house, and a bit further on, hallelujah, a farm worker!

After giving him a hug for being there we asked him for help, but no... he had to tend to his horses!  

He pointed us in the direction of a roadway which he said would lead us to getting mobile phone signals. Then my second phone would be able to get Google Maps going.

We passed another property along that roadway before the mobile reception kicked in - knocked on the door to ask for help, but no, this guy was waiting for someone so couldn't leave.  But he told us to keep walking further along the road, then turn left and left again and after about an hour we'd arrive at our carpark.

Phew!

Our 7km walk turned into a 17km one.

Oh how we laughed when I hugged our hire car. (not)

Driving to Bath tomorrow with a whole new perspective on life.

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