Pork Hill

A circular walk on Dartmoor

By Julia Revitt Photography

October 3^rd, 2020

tor [ tawr ] noun

a rocky pinnacle; a peak of a bare or rocky mountain or hill.

Piskie & Tors

Dartmoor in the South of England is an unusual place. It is often windswept, shrouded in cloud and known to have horizontal rain. On a bright, clear day in September though, it is totally stunning.

The history of Dartmoor is steeped in folklore with devilish piskies - a mischievous imp or kind fairy (depending on your experiences). Stories of headless horses, frightened hares hiding in holes and howling over the moors is enough to terrify even the most stalwart person crossing at night.

However, we sensibly visited Dartmoor on a fine autumn day in September. Well, we actually visited the day before too but couldn't see a hand in front of your face - those devious piskies at play I bet! Our second attempt was much better, clear blue skies, warm sunshine and a light breeze - just perfect.

Come and enjoy our walk from the comfort of your armchair...

The Tors of Dartmoor look more manmade than natural. Although you could easily imagine ancient civilisations ingeniously man-handling the giant slabs on top of one another, the facts suggest something quite different.

280 million years ago molten granite started to cool. This created the minerals Dartmoor is built upon - quartz, feldspar and biotite. The cooling caused the hot granite to contract creating vertical fissures which hot water ran through.

2 to 3 kilometres of slate and sandstone that covered the granite was worn away by the water. Once removed, the pressure on the granite was relieved and the giant slabs you see below were revealed.

A slight interlude...

Dartmoor Ponies are an integral part of Dartmoor life. I wasn't expecting to see any on our walk but just a few meters away from the car park, three ponies galloped behind us.

“They have been here a long time, hoof prints found on Dartmoor during an archaeological dig were found to be 3,500 yrs old!”

60 million years ago, Dartmoor was still covered in trees. The bare moorlands only occurred relatively recently as the land mass moved northwards away from the equator, causing the climate to change from sub-tropical - then the ice age came along.

Around 2 million years ago, the freezing water caused the slabs we see now to form and move. Repeated freezing and thawing caused the giant slabs to move long distances - up to a kilometre in some cases.

The slabs and the broken rocks littering the ground are the result of 280 million years of activity. Cool eh?

“It came with the wind through the silence of the night, a long, deep mutter, then a rising howl, and then the sad moan in which it died away. Again and again it sounded, the whole air throbbing with it, strident, wild and menacing”

Interesting tidbit - The Hound of the Baskervilles written by Arthur Conan Doyle in 1902 has Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson roaming around Dartmoor in search of answers. It's next on my reading list (now that I'm home!).

The Walk

Our walk was over Pork Hill near Tavistock. We parked at the Pork Hill car park on the B3357. It's an unusual car park for this area as it's big, free and properly surfaced.

After parking up, walk across the road and start ascending the first Tor directly ahead of you. After a few breathless minutes you'll be at the top.

From there you can see 3 or 4 other nearby Tors. You can either walk back down again or walk over to the other Tors.

There are a few trails linking the various Tors - just take your pick. This walk can be as long or short as you want and there is virtually no chance of getting lost (as long as you're not in total cloud cover).