The Two Moors Way

 

For those unfamiliar with European walking and English walking in particular, let me start by saying that France and England and Switzerland and many other countries are criss-crossed by a variety of marked walking routes, some international. Some of these are very carefully marked and signed; others are not.  The Two Moors Way is a route in England which begins in Ivybridge and ends on the shore of the Bristol Channel at Lynmouth. It crosses Dartmoor and Exmoor.  The total length is about 100 miles.  The map below shows some of the through paths in the county of Devon and includes the Two Moors Way.

 

 

In November 2003 my wife Carol and I walked the Two Moors Way.  This account describes some aspects of that walk.

 

Day 0. London to Ivybridge

 

No, we didn't walk from London.  We took the train from Gatwick, changed at Reading and arrived in Plymouth.  A local bus from the train station to the bus station (further than one would expect) and then a bus to Ivybridge where we had booked a B&B.

 

Day 1.  Ivybridge to Holne

 

The day began in somewhat rainy weather.  Despite the usual weather one can expect in the English west country this was to be the only day of the seven days we walked that I'd describe as wet.  We left our B & B (the Toll House) and walked into the center of town to visit the Dartmoor Information Center.  Possibly because all of England was watching the rugby championship (England defeated Australia for the world title), they were unable to do more than leave a message at the inn in Holne where we wanted to stay.

 

We climbed steeply up and out of the village, along a river, and soon reached the open moors.  Once onto Dartmoor, the markings of the Two Moors Way  disappear.  However we were equipped with maps and a guidebook and were quite prepared to navigate with compass and map whenever the route was unclear (as it usually was).  In fact there is no one route and the walker often has a choice: tramway or hilltop, valley or ridge.

 

We successfully found a route above the prominent tramway (a remains of mining days on Dartmoor) and eventually to an ancient clapper bridge.  Lots of very soggy ground soaked out boots. We saw many of the famous Dartmoor ponies both today and tomorrow. We skirted Huntingdon Warren (a hill where rabbits were once raised) and passed several prehistoric stone enclosures.  We lost the main route and continued vaguely northeast until near some farms we were forced to turn north.  Though we never saw Ludgate (which should have been a landmark), we did find the route to Scorriton, a village which, though it had a nice looking pub (closed when we arrived), seemed  a bit too bovine for us to stay.  We continued on to Holne where we found the Church House Inn.  Though they were closed (until 6:30 PM), we learned by phoning that they had left the key for us in the unlocked vestibule.  We were delighted with the place as our room was lovely and ancient (the inn is 14^th century).  The day totalled only about 13 miles.

The village itself was very charming with good views and lots of thatched buildings.

 

Cleaned up and relaxed we came down for our evening meal which exceeded our expectations.  Beef carpaccio as a starter, lamb hot pot and rabbit casserole as mains and sticky toffee pudding for dessert. Definitely one of our best evening meals.  Very friendly service as well.

 

Day 2. Holne to Widecombe-in-the-Moor.

 

This was planned as a short day to give us a chance to recover from the flight.  If I had taken the shortest route, we could have finished in about two hours.  However I was determined to get out on the moors again and took a roundabout route.

 

We left after an excellent English breakfast. (I may as well note that this was the case everywhere we stayed.)  The route took us down along a river with a lovely horeshoe waterfall and then back up to the moors where we walked with views into a deep valley.  At a critical navigation point, I aimed in the general direction and came out only a hundred meters or so from the intersection.  This was great luck.  We took the roads (open lanes crossing the moors) into Widecombe.  This village has a picturesque setting and hosts a famous fair each summer.  Its tall church is very beautiful.

 

Though we had some cloudy weather with brief showers, by nightfall it was clear and moonless with the stars bright.

 

Our B&B was an old thatched cottage where I had once stayed.  A mile or so outside of the village, we had an atmospheric half mile walk to dinner at the Rugglestone Pub.

 

Day 3. Widecombe to Drewsteignton.

 

After the usual big breakfast, we were on our way in blue skies and bright sun.  We climbed steadily to Hameldown Beacon and then across the easily followed (and, judging by the footpath erosion, very popular) route across Two Barrows and down to Grimspound.  (This is a well known stone age enclosure.)  We turned westwards to stay on the moors which we could see disappearing around us as views of farms and hills instead of moorland became more common.  We passed several more stone age sites including a double row of standing stones.  Then we stuck to the roads for a while and arrived in Chagford.  This delightful town has lots of pubs and would have been a good place to stay had we a day or so extra to spare.  Unfortunately we were on a fairly tight schedule and it was necessary to push on.  We decided to take the river path to Drewsteignton and near Castle Drogo took the road again to save some time. 

 

We were soon in Drewsteignton at the Old Inn Guest House.  Again a lovely room. The pub, The Drewe Arms, was right across the square and was exceptional.  I had sausages with bubble-n-squeak and Carol had lamb shank.  We sat near a wood fire.

 

Day 4.  Drewsteignton to Morchard Bishop.

 

After breakfast we had a look around the village of Drewsteignton.  Lots of thatched cottages around a church exceptionally lovely.  Having left Dartmoor behind, it was over fields and roads.  We  passed a large stone house and met the former owner who had sold it to expand her farm.  The soil was red and we soon passed through a farmyard with nearly ankle deep mud/manure mix. This was  a fairly long day and at Down st. Mary we stopped to strap on lights and reflectors to walk the remaining several miles on the road to Morchard Bishop.  The village was well lit with lots of street lights.  After a bit of a search, we found our B&B (which was unlabelled) but which was right near the London Pub.  This village was a bit bigger and a bit less charming than some of the others we had seen.  However the B&B (Kantara) and the pub were both excellent and good value as well. Carol had steak and ale pie and I had stuffed plaice.

 

Day 5.  Morchard Bishop to Knowstone

 

I'd finally had my full of bacon/eggs/sausage and just had cereal, beans, mushrooms, and toast.  Though we stayed on roads to avoid the mud, we did find one very deep patch that we couldn't avoid.  Today was the first day we were able to find a pub at lunch time.  The Mitre, in Witheridge furnished a pleasant break.  Then we went along the river for some miles. Eventually the route passed under a highway  where a  rerouting of the trail had involved building walkways and bridges through a patch of woods.  We just made the 19 miles into Knowstone by dark.  At Rosemary Cottage B&B we received a wonderful welcome and were shown to our three room suite.  A few hundred yards through the village took us to the Masons Arms, a 14^th century pub with a terrific mural on the ceiling and a real character as the owner. Food was good and we had our best desserts here: summer pudding and warm chocolate cake.

 

Day 6. Knowstone to Withypool

 

In the morning I had smoked trout and scrambled eggs while Carol had the usual complete English breakfast.

 

With only 12 miles to do, we took our time leaving.  We went across some fields passing shooters looking for pheasants. Then we visited a church in W. Anstey where the bell changes were listed in the tower.  (This is probably common but it was startling for me, a mathematician, to see the same information that might appear in a book on Group Theory in a church, even though I knew the mathematical basis of change bell ringing.)  In a while we were up on Exmoor where we were surprised to encounter a hunt for hinds. They had a hind in sight and Carol saw it on the next hillside.  This type of hunting is done with a pack of dogs and the hunters on horseback.  The hind is hunted by the horses and hounds until surrounded and exhausted. Then it is shot. Is this cruel? You decide.

 

The descent took us to a river which we followed to Tarr Steps a long clapper bridge.  We stopped there for a cream tea and then continued along the river to Withypool. Parts of the walk were a bit rough and we were concerned about the lateness but we made it without difficulty.  The inn at Withypool, the Royal Oak, is not one I would recommend.  The food was only fair and the room a very poor value at ₤100 .  However the B&B we wanted was filled, no doubt with hunters.

 

Day 7. Withypool to Lynmouth

 

After an early breakfast (scrambled eggs and smoked salmon for me, English for Carol) we were out.  We had 19 miles to do this day and were concerned about the time.  This was the end of November in England days are short we knew it would be very dark by 4:30.  After a brief wrong turn, we were soon climbing up onto the moors again.  A delightful walk with good views into the valley and then a descent to a river.  We followed the river on to Simonsbath.  On this route we saw lots of pheasants and passed a stone age fort, the Cow Palace.  At Simonsbath we stopped for another cream tea.  We found we were making good time but still decided to do the remainder on the road.  This decision worked well as the views of the moors were excellent from the little trafficked road.  We were delighted to sight a fox.  The last four miles followed a dramatic gorge into Lynmouth.

 

Lynmouth (as its name suggests) is a tiny seaside port.  Two gorges come together and furnish a break in the hills that dominate this part of the coast.  We had no trouble finding an excellent B&B where we were able to buy a bottle of Champagne to toast our very successful walk.

 

Dinner was in the bar of a 14^th century thatched inn, The Rising Sun.

 

Day 8. Lynmouth to London

 

The walk was now over.  Due to bad bus connections we chose to take a taxi to Taunton.  There we had our tickets rewritten to return through London to Gatwick. (This worked very well as the small extra fee covered all our remaining transportation expenses.)