Somewhere New on Dartmoor National Park!

I’ve been photographing Dartmoor for well over a decade and sometimes it feels like I’ve photographed it all! With Dartmoor National Park being just over 365 square miles in size, I think that it is unlikely that I have. But, as time goes on, it has become increasingly hard to find a location that I have never photographed before.

Inspiration can come when you least expect it though. I had a spare evening but going out to take pictures wasn’t top of my list of things to do. The weather was looking good and what I really fancied was a good walk! Opening my OSMaps app I scanned Dartmoor for a suitable route. Hovering around the Willsworthy Range I realised that I had explored very little of that area. In particular I had never been to Sharp Tor which I had visually spotted a few weeks earlier while photographing Ger Tor.

**Sharp Tor#1, Dartmoor National Park, Devon** - Nikon Z8, Nikkor Z 14-30mm f/4 S at 20mm, f/11, 1/100 sec at ISO 640.

Always Take Your Camera to Dartmoor

Excited to have found somewhere new to explore, I packed my bag with everything I would need for an evening walk on Dartmoor, including my camera. I know I said taking photographs wasn’t top of my list of things to do that evening, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t take my camera. Only that it wasn’t the primary focus of the evening!

I rarely leave home without the camera when going on a walk. You never know what you might see! It’s better to have the camera and not need it, than need the camera and not have it!

**Sharp Tor#2, Dartmoor National Park, Devon** - Nikon Z8, Nikkor Z 14-30mm f/4 S at 18mm, f/13, 1/6 sec at ISO 64.

The walk up to Sharp Tor is fairly straight foward. Having already checked there was no live firing in the range that evening, I parked at the car park near the entrance to the range. Walking up the road to the range I walked past a tent with some military folks in it I double checked it was OK to proceed and that I wasn’t going to be seen as a moving target. I was casually and politely waved on. Nothing to worry about then!

**Sharp Tor#3, Dartmoor National Park, Devon** - Nikon Z8, Nikkor Z 14-30mm f/4 S at 15mm, f/13, 1/6 sec at ISO 64.

Sharp Tor on Dartmoor - Hit or Miss?

Arriving at Sharp Tor, I was hot, but bullet free! As with the views from Ger Tor and Great Links Tor, the views from Sharp Tor are expansive and on a clear evening like I had I could see well into Cornwall.

While the views were great and well worth the walk, I wasn’t particularly convinced that Sharp Tor itself was very photogenic. Some tors immediately capture your imagination, others take several visits or a specific set of conditions. As nice as the area around the tor was, I struggled to find a strong composition of the tor itself.

So, am I done with Sharp Tor? No. Looking at my photographs now I still believe there might be some potential there. It might just take a few visits to find what makes Sharp Tor special. Not that making repeated visits to Sharp Tor will be a hardship. It’s a walk and a view that I will always look forward to.