This walk: 2017-5-4. In search of the Walkhampton poetry plaques, PCWW pillar, cycle track bridge, bluebells, early purple orchid, Walkhampton church, Walkhampton Church House Cross, Yennadon Cross.
Walk details below - Information about the route etc.
Previous walks in this area: 4th March 2009, 21st April 2010, 27th August 2010, 30th May 2012, 24th July 2013 and 1st August 2013.
Another walk in this area in search of the poetry plaques is recorded in Michael Leek's blog from 24th February 2013: The Walkhampton Plaques.
Google Satellite map + GPS track of the walk
PCWW 1917 - a Plymouth Corporation Water Works boundary stone for the Burrator reservoir's water catchment area. This one is incorporated into a hedge at the entrance to the Yennadon Down car park.
New walking / cycle track bridge installed over the B3212 in April 2015, Plymouth Herald newspaper video, report and photos .....
Closer view, this is part of the Sustrans Route 274 cycle route. Good for walking, too.
Poetry plaque 1, located at SX 54841 70247, this is today's photograph .....
Photographed on 4th March 2009, eight years previously ..... not so weathered .....
The plaque is now behind a barbed wire fence, on the corner of two hedges, indicated by the white circle..
Poetry plaque 2, located at SX 54542 70794, high on a wall under the bridge of a "cattle creep" in the old Princetown Railway .....
Photographed on 21st April 2010 ....
Beyond here be a mysterie - the whereabouts of the elusive Plaque 3.
Wind-shaped tree in a lonely spot, on the bend in the railway.
Bluebell.
Early purple orchid .....
Early purple orchid leaves, quite distinctive.
A wooded glade with bluebells.
Nameplate leading to a farm.
Walkhampton Church ..... Wikipedia .....
Walkhampton church, which is Grade I listed, is on an ancient elevated site about half a mile north-west of the village. Unlike most churches which face east, it faces north-east, the direction of the rising sun on the longest day.[6] The present building, which is built of granite and has a tower with four prominent pinnacles, dates from the 15th century, with much later alteration,[1] including restoration in 1860–61.[4] For 400 years until 1985 the church had no dedication and was known simply as "Walkhampton Church", but in that year it was dedicated to St Mary the Virgin. Research has indicated that it may have been originally dedicated to St Dionisius of Walkynton.[6][7]
Plaque 4 can be seen attached to the edge of a coping stone on the wall near the centre of the photograph, at SX 53598 70112 .....
While I saw this plaque on 17th December 2008, I did not take a photograph of it.
Walkhampton Church House Cross - there is a lot to read! The socket stone and shaft were found nearby, removed from a wall in 1976 and re-erected in 1984: these are of different sizes and were possibly from two different local crosses. The head was made by stonemasons Dart & Francis (Crediton?) and emplaced seven years later, 1991.
Another view, showing the scars of where gate hangers have been fixed to the shaft in the past when it was used as a gatepost. The head was made recently.
Further reading .....
Bill Harrison (2001), Dartmoor Stone
Crosses, Devon Books, pages 91 -92.
Harry Starkey (1989, 2nd edn), Dartmoor Crosses, Printed by A. Wheaton &
Co. Ltd, Exeter, pages 47 and 148.
Tim Sandles (1997), A Pilgrimage to Dartmoor's Crosses, Forrest
Publishing, Newton Abbot, Devon, pages 106-107.
Friendly local.
Yennadon Cross, at Yennadon Cross cross roads ..... not originally sited here and probably not in the original socket stone as one can be seen 600 yards along the road to Dousland at a farm entrance.
Showing an incised cross, apparently on each face.
Poetry plaque 5, located at SX 53130 69453, inside a gate on the approach to Walkhampton from Yelverton.
Overview of the location of plaque 5.
Putting the plaques together ....
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The View of A Lifetime When one follows a path through the wilderness that is living, And it seems set along a course so apparent of pre-set destiny. If not bounding, it may seem hard to complete one's journey, trudging. More so, if those around you beset your mind to step with mediocrity. Missing plaque 3 Missing plaque 3 Thus so, the oft' dull trek they undertook was made sweet as any fruit. Until one's vanished heartbeat, caused the other's breath to gasp its last. Reflect; -and if you feel your journey wants, for lack of twist and turn. And for constancy of change, or modification is what you yearn. Recall;-Only life's gravest change is ever certain. Then, lest time demands your call of curtain. Hear me now, "Stop:- you too!" And admire the view. Ted Davey.
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MAP: Red = GPS satellite track of the walk.
© Crown copyright and database rights 2016 Ordnance
Survey
Licence number 100047373
Also, Copyright © 2005, Memory-Map Europe, with permission.
This walk was reached by driving through Dousland on the road towards
Princetown and turning right at the end of Dousland Plantation to park at the
P
symbol on the map, also marked by the yellow cross.
Statistics
Distance - 5 km / 3 miles walked, then drove from the car park to Plaque 5.
All photographs on this web site are copyright © Keith Ryan.
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