I stopped one morning in December to catch the rising sun less than a mile east of Dartmeet at Yartor Down. The sun was rising just behind Sharp Tor, a tor I never even reflected upon until that lovely morning. See Sunrise over Sharp Tor. So I looked at my maps and became more intrigued and went back for visits and more photography in February.
In between Yartor Down and Sharp Tor is a small valley, where Row Brook is formed, meeting Dart River further south. Row Brook will feature in another post on my website next week.
Just where Row Brook is running up, a dead tree was lying and formed a beautiful frame for catching Sharp Tor in the afternoon sun. Climbing up the hill I could really see the sharpness of Sharp Tor. In the next photo the camera is looking southwest and the west southwesterly sun is lighting up the Tor.
I came back the next morning and the image below shows Sharp Tor again, but now looking northwest over endless moorland. You can really see the sharpness of the Tor.
I hiked up the Tor before sunrise and was met by a full moon ready to set as the sun prepared to “pop up” on the opposite side. The tall antenna to the left of the moon is at Princetown, in the middle of the vast Dartmoor, where also Her Majesty’s prison is located.
15 minutes after the “moonshot” the sun bathed the Tor in the first sun rays, and looking in the same direction as in the previous shot I captured the two images below. They can nearly be stitched together in a panorama. To the left is the main tor, and to the right is a separate granite outcrop, and I stood in between the two, as the sun was rising. On the right image you can still see the moon, although it is much more difficult to see, when the sun is out.
The next three images are all looking south. The first two are sunrise images, and third was taken just before sunset the day before. The valley below (best seen in the third and last image below) is River Dart, although the river itself is hidden in the valley 200 metres below.
