Higher Uppacott is a Grade 1 Listed Farm building situated near Poundsgate, Dartmoor. Most people driving on the road up from Ashburton to the Bel Tor car park must have admired it nestled into a tight bend just beyond the Methodist chapel. It has been … Continue readingHigher Uppacott Dartmoor Longhouse
There are several resources online which will give a proper and informed account of the Rifle Range just south of Rippon Tor on Dartmoor. (See especially the always-readable Legendary Dartmoor site.) This is not such a resource! The range has been a feature at … Continue readingRippon Tor Rifle Range, Dartmoor
Two weeks ago, on the last Saturday before the clocks fell back, I got up at 5:30, threw on some warm clothes, and drove down to Teignmouth beach to photograph the pier. I’d photographed it previously before the dawn, and liked the contrast between the … Continue readingScarf, gloves, woolly hat
It’s hard to beat this kind of walk: you plunge through dense woodland, steeply downhill, with views of the hills all around, descending deep into the valley, until there is the first glimpse of the river straight ahead, right across your path. The kind of … Continue readingSomewhere down the Crazy River
For 10 days in August we had a holiday in East Sussex, just North of Lewes. The owners of the lovely property where we stayed, John and Joy, are rightly very proud of their garden, and indeed Joy is a professional gardener. For whatever reason, … Continue readingJoy’s Pear Trees
Somerset artist Rob Heard began a new project in December 2013. He wanted to find a way to illustrate the scale of the loss of life on the first day of the Battle of the Somme. He started creating 12 inch figures, each wrapped in … Continue reading19240 Shrouds of the Somme, Northernhay Gardens, Exeter
A couple of weeks ago I had to drive across the Haldon Hills, but couldn’t stop to have a proper look around or take photographs. The last time I did so was when I made my second visit to the Pet Cemetery, near the Haldon … Continue readingThe simple pleasure of recognising familiar landmarks from new vantage points
Late in May I made the traditional visit to Holwell Lawn on Dartmoor for the usual outrageous display of Bluebells. Most images we all make of the ‘bells were cliches a decade ago, and even more so now, but I still go because just witnessing … Continue readingWhen the image that means the most means the least to everyone else
I’ve been watching this hill for a few months now, ever since the first signs were erected. The road here is on the edge of the town of Bovey Tracey, one of the attractive ‘gateway to Dartmoor’ towns. At far left is a digger and … Continue readingLast Spring, sheep grazed on this hill
I remember attending a talk a couple of years ago by the renowned landscape photographer Jem Southam, where he talked about his book The River Winter. He mentioned how the beautiful word ‘winterbourne’ originally referred to a river or stream that runs only in winter, and … Continue readingA winterbourne pool, Top Tor