Across the (presumed) cist to Rippon Tor.
The presumed cist. If not, what else is it?
Exquisite spot to hang out for a while... what I took to be a cist.
Looking approx NW across the heavily robbed interior to the summit of Rippon Tor... and its massive cairns.
Looking approx SE across the other (apparent) monument – impossible to verify owing to the complete gorse cover for that one. There is a large, if robbed, cairn to the right of the far copse. A nice spot.
Industrial strength gorse covers the remains of these two ‘tumuli’ upon Horridge Common. Haytor Rocks can be seen beyond.
The cairn below the tor cairn (SX68587422) utilises existing outcrops in a similar manner to (the admittedly peerless) Beinn na Caillich (the Broadford version) upon Skye.
Looking from the cairn at SX68577472 to its near northern neighbour..
(SX68587422) Looking toward the summit ‘tor cairn’....
I understand the cairns upon Corndon Tor received the expert attention of a combination of the Dartmoor National Park Authority, the Dartmoor Preservation Association and English Heritage sometime between 2005 – 2010. This is one of the magnificent northern pair.
Upon SX68677475. The sheer circumference of this monument is exceptional.
Corndon Tor from the summit cairn of Yar Tor... note the twin massive northern cairns (upper centre left) quite a trot away from the wondrous summit monuments.
The ‘tor cairn’.... little wonder the locals thought this place was special back in the day.
Summit cairn across the tor cairn..
To be honest, it’s only when one gets up close that it becomes clear this isn’t all-natural....
Upon the tor.... note the tor cairn below. Occasionally the sun doesn’t just shine upon the righteous.
Tor cairn at SX68597414. I don’t have the words to do justice to the enigmatic beauty of what is, after all, merely a ‘rocky outcrop’.
The massive summit cairn looking across the tor cairn... there is a pair of very substantial cairns on the near horizon, some way to the north.
With three magnificent round cairns here, rather ironic, perhaps, that it is the ‘tor cairn’ which is, arguably, the most enigmatic.
Denise Crosby came to mind.... funnily enough.
There is just something so hauntingly, well, primaeval about these tors...
Still quite a fair bit left, despite the damage.
Looking into the sun (the irony was not lost upon the viewer) approx SW towards the prosaic Dartmeet... where east meets west... or two become one, to quote those Spicy master 90’s philosophers.
The great tor cairn surmounting Yar Tor.... a West Country speciality-variant of the upland monument.
Northern terminal cairn.... marked as ‘Tumulus’ on the map. Looking approx south.
The ‘Money Pit’s cist with what I took to be displaced capstone.
The cairn-circle near the southern extremity of the row at SX61177386, apparently known locally as the ‘Money Pit‘