Today's adventure was intended to be a short walk and camp, giving me the time and opportunity to record three videos; a hike and camp video as usual, a "early impressions" opinion piece about my new Naturehike 60+5ltr backpack and a Trangia cooking video, but alas, as is the usual way of things, the plan changed.
The weather was amazing, 14C with blue sky dotted by fluffy white cloud and the sun never getting hidden from view. Dave and I set off from the carpark near Little Staple Tor, making sure we finally visited the Tor as we have missed it on two previous occasions. It is a pretty Tor, very small and compared to its bigger sisters quite insignificant. I will never camp at Little Links as there is no flat ground and frankly it is not a Tor worth hiking to specifically given its only a 5 minute walk from the road.
From here we started up toward Middle Staple Tor. By contrast to Little Staple, Middle Staple is an impressive Tor in it's own right, with large rock formations, good views and lots of flat ground to pitch on (if you don't mind pitching your tent where people might be walking by all day).
We spent some time here, perhaps 30 minutes, investigating the structures and having a chat with a couple of hikers and dog walkers, before moving on toward one of the most impressive Tors on Dartmoor, Great Staple Tor, also known as "The Gateway to Dartmoor" due to its twin large towers of granite, separated by an expanse of green, giving the impression of two gate posts and a missing gate!
Stopping here I cracked out the Trangia to make a coffee. While sipping away I watched a small group of teens climbing and scrambling over the formations, hoping that none of them fell or got their feet trapped in the cracks. I was amazed at how anxious I felt watching them.
After packing up the Trangia and grabbing a bit of walking video we moved on toward Roos Tor but as we set off I received a message through Instagram from Michael whose YouTube channel is Novice Wild Camper. Michael was asking if I'd mind him joining us at Roos Tor. Of course I told him he is welcome to join Dave and myself after having previously camped with him at West Mill Tor.
So after stopping to chat with Michael, Dave and I once again headed on to Roos, happy that tonights camp would be a bit more social. Walking along, recording for the video I was trying to work out if and how I could still record the other two video's while still getting a sunset timelapse and not being ignorant to Michael. In the end I decided to save the other two video's for another camp and instead enjoy Michael's company, whenever he might arrive.
Arriving at Roos Tor I spent a good hour trying to decide on where to pitch the tent. I had planned where to pitch, on the East side of the Tor, where previously I met another YouTuber for the first time, Karen of Karen's Gone Wild. She had a perfect pitch on the East side of the Tor, facing out over Great Mis Tor, but I was worried that there might not be enough space here for Michael to pitch up too. In the end though, after spending time looking over the area and with the sunset about to begin I decided there was enough space for both tents so I got pitched up.
I had a little difficulty with the pitch this time. I think that the lines coming from the bathtub of the Lanshan 2 Pro are slightly too long, meaning the the bathtub does not have very vertical corners. I think I need to change these lines for elastic in the future.
After pitching I set the camera up on the tripod atop Roos Tor, facing West to capture the sunset over Cox Tor then started on dinner. Tonights dinner was to be cheesy steak slices, marinated in a mix of black pepper and garlic with mixed sweet peppers and onion in tortilla pockets. Something of a fajita without the herbs and spices.
Just as I was dishing up my evening dinner in the near dark Michael announced his presence with a ghostly "ooOOooohh" for some reason. Strange bloke. Needless to say I was not terrified, but Dave was not impressed one bit. Dave went into full on angry mode, barking aggressively at Michael's feet. My boy has some attitude at times despite being timid most of the time. Michael did not seem to care, as Dave is not a particularly intimidating dog! Michael really needed to get a move on to pitch his Lanshan 1 Plus before he lost the light completely, but he did not refuse one of my tortilla pockets when I offered it to him, despite it meaning he'd lose a little more light.
Donning his head torch Michael got the Lanshan 1 Plus pitched much faster than I'd managed with mine. I fed Dave his dinner and made a coffee, chatting with Michael about all of this and that well into the night.
I found it funny just how relaxed I was with Michael. Having camped with him before I now found it to be more like camping with an ages old buddy. Dave would not relax around him though. At one point Michael took a first look inside my tent, but Dave was inside and he gave Michael a menacing low growl. For a moment I was concerned Michael might be going home the next day without his nose.
Bedding down around 11:30pm after a few coffee's and a can of cider I had a little trouble with Dave. You see, I have been worrying about him getting cold at night in the tent so lately I have been bringing extra's for him such as my Snugpack Jungle Blanket and my OEX Furnace 8+ sleeping bag liner, so this week I bought him his very own waterproof sleeping bag made by GEERTOP specifically for dogs. Long story short though, Dave did not want to be in his own sleeping bag, he wanted to be in mine and stubbornly refused to move to allow me to get into my bag. I love him, but at times like this I wish I'd left him home.
The night was wonderfully uneventful with very little wind, no rain and a nice constant temperature of 9C however I did get chilly. Tonight I was using my new Unigear Campfy P3 Air sleeping mat which Michael himself had recently reviewed on his channel. It has an R-value of 2 making it a million times warmer to sleep on than my usual Trekology Aluft UL80 which is definitely not a cold weather mat! I was also using my new 4 season (comfort to -1C) OEX Fathom EV400 sleeping bag which I was most unimpressed with. The side of my body I laid on was nice and toasty warm but the opposite side of my body was not kept warm by the sleeping bag. I woke up several times in the night as shivers rocked my body. I vowed to replace the EV400 as soon as possible.
I'd set an alarm for 7am which would wake me in time to watch the sunrise, though I didn't need it as I woke naturally at 6:40am anyway. I prompted Michael at 7am though to make sure he did not mis the sunrise either. We set our camera's running in Timelapse mode to capture what we hoped would be an epic sight of the sun rising over Great Mis Tor and stood there watching it while our water boiled for morning coffees. It was beautiful.
I have not witnessed a full sunrise on Dartmoor before, in fact I am not certain that I ever have at anytime in my life, though I am certain that I have never taken the time to appreciate it. This morning though I did and I was glad for it.
Breakfast this morning was something new to me. I have not eaten porridge since I was a kid and I did not like it then at all. I've not entertained it since until today. I have to say, I was not particularly impressed. It is Ready Brek (which I DO like) with lumps! I will try it again on my next camp, perhaps I'll remember to bring along some chocolate chips to throw in for a sweeter taste?
Neither Michael nor myself were in a hurry to pack up and head off, instead we decided to allow the tents some time to dry inside and out in the morning sun and enjoy a couple more coffees. Dave was in a better mood this morning too, suddenly the aggression toward Michael was gone and they were friends again. That dog is strange. Perhaps Dave was just a bit tired from the walk the previous day?
After a few hours of chatting, eating, drinking coffee and taking photo's of Roos Tor and the views beyond we got packed up and before setting off we made sure that we left no evidence of our being there and recorded a signing out video then headed off back toward the Staple Tors and to our cars, enjoying the once again beautiful weather and views along the way.
What an enjoyable wild camp this was, every criteria for a great camp was met; beautiful weather, a nice hike, a brilliant pitch on flat ground with shelter from possible wind, good food, sunset and sunrise stunning views and most importantly, great company.
Editing the footage from this camp was actually a joy for once and I am impressed that I managed to get the overall length down to just 12 minutes and 54 seconds. Much of my recording was just walking shots but I got to play with the tracking features of the DJI Pocket 2, something I've not really played with before aside from some accidental Face Tracking shots that never really worked This time I used the Object Tracking feature to track my full body walking across the moors and Tors. There is some spots in the video that this feature is being used and it gets a bit jerky. I left these in on purpose as I was recently question by Carl (whose channel is Dartmoor Explorer) about the tracking capabilities of the Pocket 2. In future though, when I use tracking features I will edit out the jerky shots.
I really liked how Michael and I worked well together in this video. I think it demonstrates well just how well we got along. I must say though, Michael's video on this camp does a much better job of showing this.
That you for reading, I hope you enjoy the video(s)!
My video of this camp is below and you can watch Michael's take on the camp on his channel here.
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