The scout had heard from Jim and Ruth at Devon Timber that the boardwalks on Padley Common, made with oak from Christow, had been completed and so he went to have a look.
The B3212 turnpike had only been reopened a few days before, after being closed for months to allow the heavy engineering work needed to stabilize the road.
The scout also stopped to view the former Moretonhampstead Cottage Hospital, which was built and endowed in 1900 by Lord Hambleden (W.F.D. Smith), who later built the North Bovey Manor House. The Parish Council has petitioned to save the building for a use beneficial to the community.
Chagford
The not unpleasing new Primary School, opened in 2018 by Sir Michael Morpurgo, was vehemently opposed by parents and residents who felt that the former Chagford Senior School, a 1936 “model school,” should have been renovated and modernized instead of spending £2.6-million on a replacement. The old quadrangular building became a Secondary Modern and then a Primary. It has now been demolished.
Not far from the school, going towards town, was where the scout was privileged to see the work of artist Alan Lee, who lived in a cottage on Lower Street. In 1991 the scout was seeking a cartoonist and called there for advice. His wife led him to Lee’s studio in the back garden, where he was working on 50 fantastic paintings for “Lord of the Rings.” The Tolkien family had allowed the book to be illustrated and the scout was among the first to see the artist’s work.
Bellacouch Meadow resulted from a successful National Park masterplan. C.G. Fry & Son, one of the craft building firms responsible for the Duchy’s Poundbury, have built “93 sympathetically designed homes, with a style becoming of the beautiful local surroundings as well as the adjacent town’s history.”
The housing estate is an adjunct to the town, not a new town, as is Poundbury, so there are no shops or businesses. The same well made buildings in a variety of styles are present but the place was too small to have incorporated the bold ideas of Poundbury; the road layout is conventional but with some character.
The scout has deep reservations about housing estates but would say without hesitation that this development is much better in appearance and design than nearly all that he has seen.
Glimpses may be had of Nansledan on the outskirts of Newquay and Poundbury, the urban extension of Dorchester.
Before lunch, the scout rode along Meldon Road and followed the path to Padley Common.
Thanks are due to Jim and Ruth of Devon Timber for making this connection possible.
James Bowden & Son Hardware & Moorland Centre, the labyrinthine general store, was once visited by Digby Jones as part of a television series about his attempts to redirect struggling businesses. He said that the place made no sense at all but he loved it and his advice to the owners was to change nothing.
Extraordinarily, there was another just like it next door. Webber & Sons sadly closed their doors in 2016.
Cows and calves were sitting on the thin grass and the animals took no notice of the scout pushing his bike between them. When he reached the summit of Meldon Hill, he took some moving images.