By: Blonde Two
I have mentioned in a previous blog post that Dartmoor has many gates and towns that have the title “Gateway to the Moor”. Most of these gates are quite ordinary, designed to keep some things in, some things out and to let (just a very few) of these things swap places. Most of them are just plain old open and shut gates, lots of them are surrounded by deep mud and a few are a bit argumentative about being closed properly (obviously we always do).
We don’t have very many “kissing” gates on Dartmoor which is a bit of a shame as kissing can be so much fun. The family Blonde Two insist on kissing when we go through one which can make things a bit tricky if I am have got my “family head” and not my “leader head” on when we are out on expedition. Thankfully, I haven’t kissed any unsuspecting youngsters yet. Neither, you will be relieved to hear, have I mistakenly kissed Blonde One.
On Saturday’s Blonde Dartmoor Bimble (five hours really is more than a Bimble), we were excited to be going to find some rather interesting sounding gates. Owley Gate, we presumed would echo to a cacophony of mysterious hooting and be surrounded by big yellow eyes, peering out from dark trees. Whereas Ball Gate would be kind of round and friendly, in the middle of a round wall which surrounded a round field full of round boulders.
We were quite wrong (obviously this was a bit of a shock). Owley gate was, well, just a gate into a lane, although some of the nearby cottages did have owl type names. Ball Gate, on the other hand, was both unexpected and impressive. The photo tells the story but we Two Blondes feel that we should award it to our Gatekeeper who is not called Ed, but who does guard our blog with honour and valour. There you go Gatey – a Dartmoor gate to be proud of!
Is the next post title going to rhyme with date and gate? I can’t wait.
A lick of paint, & the balls on the top changed to giant gold leaf covered jelly babies & l think it would be perfect ma’am(s). This gatey is suitably impressed 🙂
Glad you like it Gatey. We will get the kids on the renovation works. If we spot any more exciting gates, we will let you know!
Ball gate is very cool – loads of amazing archeological features around there.
Sorry – that’s the geek in me coming out…..
Dartmoor geeks are always welcome. A great area for finding things which is probably why we were late down off the moor on Saturday!
When we visited Ball Gate we had walked up a midget infested lane up from Shipley bridge where it opened up to open moorland and then this incredible gateway. Because there are no people in your pic it doesn’t quite do justice to the sheer scale and size and grandness of the gateway. So unexpected on this part of the moor! Another 365 ticked off!!!!!!
Four squares on Saturday – really chuffed. Total 166 so plenty more to explore 🙂
Ooooo we are very close. I’m at 168!!!! Vast swathes of the north moor need walking on!!! Oh and the lane we walked up wasn’t full of short people, but lots of annoying MIDGIES!! Darn predictive text!
I feel like I need to do all of the missing North moor bits soon in case my knees give up. Some strange training routes may be coming up!! I bet there is one member of your family who has done nearly all of the squares?
I don’t know-because of the 365 I have been to places he hasn’t!!!! He’s on a slightly bigger challenge. I bought him the tors of Dartmoor book, so he’s trying to photograph his dog on top of them all!!! And there are loads. Far more than those marked on the os map!!!! Oh and then there’s all the county tops as well!!!!
Not sure if this will work, but give it a try:
click here for The Gatekeepers:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/48kt2t8kb9g8r6t/Gatekeepers.jpg
If not, copy and put into your web browser.
I love it … Jelly Baby Gatekeepers. What more could a Blonde want. Thank you Conrad, a little bit of Dartmoorshop magic going on there I think.