Today we would be walking to Okehampton on the edge of Dartmoor. Harpal is still with us and we are joined by Jonathon. No official driver today but Mike will pick up our bags later on.
We left Sampford Peverell in the bright sunshine for our long trek to Okehampton. Sampford Peverell is an old Saxon settlement, called Sanforda in the 1086 Doomsday Book. Its current name reflects its inclusion in the Honour of Peverel, the lands of William Peverel and his family. In 1810 it was reported that the house of a John Chave in the village was experiencing dramatic poltergeist activity. The case was discussed in the national press of the time, and Chave’s house gained such notoriety that in 1811 it was besieged by a mob of rowdy workmen known as Navies. The paranormal activity turned out to be noises made by smugglers behind a false wall.
A lovely start to the day, weather wise, as we walked towards Tiverton, quite a bit of “rush hour” and school traffic to contend with.
As we walked into Tiverton we passed by Blundell’s School – an independent school founded in 1604 under the will of Peter Blundell, one of the richest men in England at the time, and moved to its present site on the outskirts of the town in 1882. While the full boarding fees are £36,960 per year, the school offers several scholarships and bursaries, and provides flexi-boarding. The school has 350 boys and 225 girls. Tiverton’s name is conjectured to derive from “Twy-ford-ton” or “Twyverton”, meaning “the town on two fords”, and was historically referred to as “Twyford”. The town stands at the confluence of the rivers Exe and Lowman. Lord Palmerston (1784–1865) was MP for Tiverton (1835–65) and twice prime minister .
We passed the HSBC branch so took the obligatory photo and then crossed over the River Exe on the way out of town. Chris had joined us with Sasha (her dog) for the walkthrough Tiverton and a while further out of town.
As we meandered through the Devon countryside we passed through several small villages, all pretty and quaintly named, especially Puddington with its churches and thatched houses. Then our route took us down a steep hill, described as unmetalled, luckily the hill on the way up was properly “metalled”.
1200 kilometers walked by now as we passed though more villages with large churches and thatched houses as we found a sheltered spot out of the wind to have our lunch.
Getting closer now to Okehampton, and a slowly setting sun, we had our first views of Dartmoor in the distance.
The heavens opened and the temperature dropped making the last few km into Okehampton a bit of struggle. The first picture above is stark evidence of Devon and Cornwall planning policy – thousands of identikit houses crammed together – these are cropping up everywhere with no underlying infrastructure to support (sorry – rant over). Finally, wet, tired and sore we made it into Okehampton – 55km walked, 1,129m climbed and over 11.5 hours walking – but importantly one day closer to the end.
Big thanks to Harpal and Jonathon, as mentioned previously we really do appreciate the company, chat and commitment in joining us for parts of our walk.
Tomorrow we finally make it to Cornwall with a rest day in sight.