This week Mrs T and I decided to go out to Huccaby Tor which is quite near to Dunnabridge Pound and Laughter Tor. I thought it would be nice to take along an old film camera (Yashica Mat 6x6 TLR loaded with Kodak Tri-X) as well as my usual Fuji X-T2s. The weather at home was very foggy but the forecast was for it to clear later in the morning and by the time we reached Dunnabridge Pound it was clear.
Huccaby Tor
The Judge’s Chair in Dunnabridge Pound.
The map had promised an easy walk following Bridlepaths from Dunnabridge Farm out to Laughter Tor then across to Huccaby Tor. We parked in the car park that overlooks Dunnabridge Pound and after a short walk along the road we were at the Farm which was the first shot with the Yashica.
Photo courtesy of Mrs T.
The result.
I also took the time to shoot the Judge's Chair with the Yashica.
After this shoot we set off up the Bridlepath towards Laughter Tor, it started quite rocky.
Along the way there was some nice light on Bellever Tor.
It wasn’t long before we saw Laughter Tor and the old Sheep Pound where we planned to have lunch.
As is often the case on Dartmoor the weather and light were changeable which gave some interesting cloud formations.
We arrived at the Sheep Pound which is a very interesting structure, a walled enclosure but without a gate.
While we were inside the Pound a squall of rain came through but the walls of the pound gave good shelter.
As we sat having lunch I noticed through the gateway Haytor Rocks in the distance, I hadn’t appreciated we would get such a view.
I got out the longer lens for a shot of the rocks plus Saddle Tor and Rippon Tor.
We have been to Laughter Tor before so we didn’t do so much exploration this time as we had Huccaby Tor in our sights. I did take a couple of shots though for completeness.
It caught some nice light as we were moving away.
On the way down the side of Leather Tor we came upon the Standing Stone, a structure of some 8-9 feet in height overlooking the old gateway down to Huccaby Tor.
Next stop Huccaby Tor via those Bridlepaths………
The irony of all this is that the gateway and the track are not the actual Bridlepath, the one marked on the map, they are about 300m North East of the marked Bridlepath which by the way cannot be seen on the ground it has long since been disused and reclaimed by nature. What we were now following was a Quad track that went in roughly the right direction, not a problem in this visibility but if it had been foggy it would have been inconvenient to say the least.
Eventually the Quad track was no longer going in the right direction, we were looking for the Outer Huccaby Ring (an old settlement) that is on the edge of the marked Bridlepath so we turned off the Quad track and bashed through the tussock grass until we reached the Outer Ring. This wasn’t what I was expecting either, the stone walls are long gone and the base of them is now overgrown with mainly Gorse.
There was a sort of track though which we could see lead to a gate at the edge of the enclosure where Huccaby Tor sits, again though the gate is not on the original Bridlepath route.
Once through the gate we were able to explore the Tor, it is a small Tor but very interesting and photogenic.
There were several Ponies grazing on the Tor.
They were obviously used to human company, this one just wouldn’t leave Mrs T alone, I think people must give them food/treats when they visit the Tor.
I had to shoo her away 3 times before I could set up my tripod for the Yashica.
Photo courtesy of Mrs T.
The shots, once again my thanks to Chris at Spectrum Photolabs in Plymouth for turning my film around quick enough so I coulld include the shots here. http://www.spectrumphotolabs.co.uk/
Once done with the film shoot we set off back to the car and once out of the pound we could see the track that we should have followed on the way out here, we just couldn’t see it from the other direction.
It led us between 2 fenced areas that were clearly collapsed mine shafts, we were glad they were fenced.
We had seen these fenced areas from the other direction as we came off Laughter Tor but they looked like one big one which was one of the reasons we folllowed the Quad track.
Eventually we reached the main Bridlepath again.
This led us back to Dunnabridge Farm then it was just a short walk along the road to the car park.
That’s all for this week folks, as usual comments welcome.
Tags: Landscape and travel shoot film Dartmoor Photowalk HUccaby Tor Dunnabridge Pound
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