Castle Drogo

Sentries

Whereas my daughter's blog declares it is to keep family & friends informed of my actions/movements on the other side of the world, my blog achieves the same end only as a sort of by-product. Which of course begs the question...

It is for this reason that I feel under no particular obligation to inform my readers how the past few weeks have been a wild succession of trips and food and late nights (this being my excuse for not posting). Due to the conjunction here of all four of my children and progeny, K visiting from Oz and J&R+ from AK. About which I may share more highlights some other time.

One of our many trips was to Castle Drogo on the northern edge of Dartmoor. It is or was a stately home built of local granite stone in a modernistic castle style and boasting a leaking roof. It is now owned by the National Trust who are graciously repairing the leaks at considerable expense aided by the entrance fees we were obliged to pay.

Temporary roof whilst leaks are being fixed

You can of course find out the details yourself - we found it amazing that anyone should have private funds to build such a structure and, having the funds, should choose to spend them in this way. The scale is colossal. A pity they didn't pay more attention to the roof design.

Consider carving this granite block - one of many!

In its day electricity was not widespread - but Castle Drogo had its own d.c. hydro generating scheme, electric lighting and even electric lifts.

The electricity distribution room

The National Trust is also restoring the hydro scheme so we had to check this out. We found an off-cut of the new cable and descended to the floor of the Teign gorge via the cable excavations.

3-phase cable - looks like low voltage

Is somewhere under my scantily clad grandson

The turbine house was obviously at the end of the cable, though the other side of the river. The next must-do was to find the weir. It turned out to be a local swimming hole and so I stripped to underwear and jumped in, my aim being to check out the new water extraction details on the other side.

The weir and fish ladder. I swam to the right.

This whole area is another of the many, many places I would love to explore more thoroughly sometime, but I am coming to think that my life may not be long enough to satisfy such desires. I would run, barefoot, the length of Teign gorge with swims whenever the mood took me.

OS map of the gorge

Why did the river decide to create this gorge rather than taking what would appear (in my next map) to be an easier and more direct route to the sea? Strange, but so far I have not found an answer - geology sites I have visited seem to take the present course for granted.

Course of the Teign river
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