The lands that time forgot
WE have lived for long walks this winter and have sometimes found a windy hilltop the only fit place for socialising. Without disparaging Britain’s wonderful well-known landmarks, most of us have learnt to avoid their inevitable madding crowds. By road and path (not as the crow flies), it’s 1,200 or so miles from Land’s End to John O’Groats and we could have walked that distance three, possibly four times since the first lockdown began last March. This is academic, however, as it would have been unwise (possibly illegal) to undertake such a lengthy stroll, even with a pocket full of face masks and hand sanitiser. Instead, let’s imagine we can zig-zag around, stopping as we please on this imaginary journey to discover some of this country’s secret wonders and plan for when we can really spread our wings.
1 Gwennap Pit, Cornwall
The wind was high on September 6, 1762, when John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement, was attempting to preach. He and his congregation took shelter in a strange, conical hollow formed by a collapsed copper mineshaft just outside the village of Gwennap, near Redruth; the acoustics were phenomenal and he called it ‘the most magnificent spectacle this side of Heaven’. Wesley preached there 18 times and Gwennap Pit became an icon of the Methodist movement. Between 1803 and 1806, 12 rings were carved into its edges, creating amphitheatre-like seating for 1,500, although, apparently, 32,000 once crammed in to hear Wesley speak. It now hosts an annual service, plus concerts and theatrical performances.
2 Carn Euny, Cornwall
This is a strange place, particularly when viewed from the air, because we’re so used to seeing ruins in squares or rectangles, but ancient man had no such love of angles. Higgledy-piggledy foundations of 2nd- to 4th-century stone huts can be seen at Carn Euny, near Sancreed on the Penwith peninsula, abandoned in the late-Roman period. The settlement boasts an Iron Age underground tunnel, 65ft long, called a ‘fogou’ and particular to far-west Cornwall. No one knows what it was for, but the care that went into its construction reveals its importance.
3 Wistman’s Wood, Devon
The visiting Revd John Swete summed it up perfectly in 1797: ‘Silence seemed to have taken up her abode in this sequestered wood—and to a superstitious mind some impression would have occurred approaching to dread, or sacred horror.’ A remnant of a vast forest that covered Dartmoor thousands of years ago, Wistman’s Wood is full of twisted dwarf oaks that form a canopy over a carpet of granite boulders, all covered in damp, rich moss and lichen. Its name stems from the old Devonshire wisht, meaning ‘eerie’ or ‘pixie-led’ and locals associate it with ancient druids and the ‘soul-raving’ Wild Hunt of Dartmoor—a ghoulish spectacle of hell-hounds (or wisht hounds) pursuing sinners across the moor at night.
4 Doddiscombsleigh, Devon
So hard to find you’d be forgiven for calling it Brigadoon, the village of Doddiscombsleigh is a happy haven amid tiny twisting lanes in the Haldon Hills. The 15th-century stained glass in St Michael’s Church is second to none but that at Exeter Cathedral and the award-winning NoBody Inn—so-named for its 1950s landlord whose mourners accidentally buried an empty coffin—used to fill the bellies of 18th-century manganese miners. It now does the same for locals and visitors lucky enough to find the place among the mists of Dartmoor.
5 Burrow Mump, Burrowbridge, Somerset
An excellent lookout for marauding Danes, which was Alfred the Great’s purpose when he climbed it, Burrow Mump (literally ‘hill hill’) is only 79ft tall, but the views over the Somerset Levels are extensive. In winter, when the rivers Parrett and
