A Short-ish Haytor round

[garyhortop]

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This is not a route a would normally recommend on Dartmoor -mainly because this is the Dartmoor equivalent of Pen-y Fan or Snowdon. It usually full of tourists! However, as I only had limited time available and its the nearest part of the moor to me....and I needed a walk to escape the Christmas madness! (Yes I know...bah humbug!).

Rather than start this walk by the many car parks adjacent to Haytor I went off the beaten track a bit and picked up the car park at GR769777 just north of Haytor Vale (OS explorer OL28).

Leave the car park and and head north following the obvious path that contours around the lower slopes of Black Hill. This is a nice steady climb up to the summit with some good views in all directions including the seaside of the Teign Estuary to the south!

Teign Estuary from Black Hill

BlacK Hill form Car park

Black Hill Summit

From the summit of Black Hill head south West (almost towards Haytor Rocks) and follow the obvious path heading down into a shallow valley between Balck Hill and Smallcoombe rocks. You will then meet another obvious path - at this cross roads take the steepr path down the side of the valley heading towatds a river valley and wooded area with Hound Tor and Greator visible on the other side of the valley (in between the showers!!)

Back to Black Hill

Haytor form Back Hill

Hound Tor (background) and Greator (Foreground)

Rain coming in!

The pathway is quite well worn and shouldn't be too difficult to follow - but erosion here means that when you get to the bottom of the valley the route on isn't quite so obvious so follow the river bank to your right and you will then find a break in the bank and path leading to an ancient stone bridge.

Stone Bridge below Greator

The path is much easier to see the other side of the bank and head up (a steepish climb) through the valley through 2 gates. As you climb take the time to stop and look back as the view across the valley towards haytor and Smallcombe rocks is quite pretty. After a short climb you will come out under the rocks of Greator.

Haytor form Greator

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Follow the obvious path towards Hound Tor and you will see the medeival settlement in the Valley and a short climb up to the base of Hound Tor.

Hound Tor from Greator

Medeival Settlement between Greator and Hound Tor

Hound Tor - some good bouldering here!

Rainbows over Greator

You then head back the way you cam towards Greator and back down into the valley and cross the river again. However, as you come out of the tree's take a path off to your right that countor's round and heads toward Holwell Tor. This climbs steadily up and you will cross one of the granite tramways. This area has a number of granite tramways that hark back to the time when this area was quarried for its granite. It's quite unusual as the tramway "rails" are made of granite and the railway trams used to run on them. There is a national trust visitor centre at Parke House just outside Bovey Tracy where you can still see some of the trams that used to run on the rails.

Granite Tramway

Carry on the staedy climb inot the saddle between small combe rocks and Holwell Tor and continue the climb as Saddle Tor will soon come into view and that is where you want to head (although you can of course divert across to Holwell Tor). Again, worth taking a look around here as the views across the valley again are quite startling.

Greator and Hound Tor from Holwell Tor

Quarries at Holwell Tor

Saddle Tor

Carry on to the summit of Saddle Tor and from there you can get some good views across to Haytor and to the South West is Rippon Tor.

Haytor from Saddle tor

From Saddle Tor follow the obvious path (and most of the crowds) on up to Haytor rocks where you can clamber over the rocks to the summit and admire the views around.

Saddle tor and Rippon Tor

Once you have finished playning on the rocks (sorry I just can't help myself!) you can follow the foot of the rocks around and head north east towards Haytor quarry. It can get a bit boggy along this bit so take care not to lose any small children or dogs in the process. You then reach a fenced area around the top of the quarry (to stop same dogs and small children from falling in - as well as sheep and ponies). You can follow the fence either way and its gated and worth a look in this quarry as there is a bit of old machinery around if you are into that sort of thing.

Beano the bogtrotting Border!

Haytor Quarry

At the Eastern end of the quarry you will pick up a clear path and a bit of tramway heading north (The Templar Way). From here there is again a reasonably obvious path heading back towards Black Hill. As time was getting on and the sun heading lower I went on back to the summit of Black Hill to try and get some sunset piccies of the moor! From the summit you again follow the path back down to the car park form wence you started the walk.

Granite tramway by Haytor Quarry

Sunset on the Moor

Merry Christmas everyone!!

[willywalker247]

Looked like you had a great walk, some great pics

[garyhortop]

Yep - it was a nice walk and apart from one very large group of ramblers around Greator I had most of it to myself which is pretty unusual in that area of the moor! PLan to do a few "moor" walks ready for your next venture out of the wilds of Wales!