It began because of Covid, when two friends, a musician and a cameraman, found themselves out of work. Lockdown left them with no income. Their working lives had come to a sudden halt. It was a desperate time for many people, including those like these two, who were self employed and worked in the creative industries. With nothing they could do, they looked to the moor that lay close to their respective homes and one day the musician said to the cameraman: ‘Let’s go for a walk’
It’s a good job that Jonny Crosbie, the cameraman, said yes to his friend Sean Lakeman’s suggestion of a walk.
They decided to climb a tor and reaching the top, pleased with their achievement, they said, ‘Let’s make it 10.’ So, in the days that followed they walked up another nine tors. As they went they recorded their walks on Instagram, people liked it and soon they had made a decision to aim for a hundred tors.
‘We felt we needed a purpose or a hobby, and we had to exercise. We just had to do something to get ourselves out of this depression,’ says Jonny, reflecting on how they got started. For someone used to travelling around the world for work, filming various documentaries and TV shows, lockdown had ‘totally screwed everything up’.
‘Jonny works in film and TV and me in music and both of these industries completely stopped,’ says Sean. ‘The government was telling people to retrain, it was in freefall collapse, infact we’re still reeling from the impact of it now. We were in the same boat, no furlough, no working from home...
‘The walks were about taking advantage of the good things we do have. We were so lucky to be living on Dartmoor and not in a flat in Peckham.’
Sean had more knowledge of the moor, it’s been a creative resource as well as a much loved place to explore with his family. ‘But I’d not ventured to see some of the more remote parts and visited them systematically,’ he adds.
‘We both live on the south west tip of the moor so we started there, then we went further afield, going off the beaten track to parts of the moor we’d never been to.’
Sean also appreciated talking to Jonny while on their walks, conversations that both revealed and eased the anxiety of the time and helped them cope with the curveball life had thrown at them.
Jonny says the experience created a bond, far more than if they’d just met in a pub for a drink, and as for being on the moor... ‘I personally found great comfort in the moors, the silence and beauty was very comforting during a very, very tricky time for both of us. It was a place where we could just leave everything behind for a few good hours. Sean’s trusty Dog Barley was (and is) almost always with us. We pulled him out of a few bogs more than a few times on a beautiful hot summer’s day in Covid.
‘We would walk and just not really see anybody, apart from the occasional pony and sheep and the odd walker. It was quite strange because we never really saw a soul about!’
‘The weather caught us a few times,’ says Sean, Not to mention the bogs, and they were even chased by a bull once.
Dartmoor is a landscape that needs to be treated with ‘great respect’ they say, and the tors can be very difficult to reach.
They both vividly remember Hen Tor, partly because they found ‘the most difficult route to get to it’, across rivers and mires, says Sean. ‘We’d not planned it, but seen it in the distance - but the tors all look closer than they are!’
‘It was the hardest walk we’ve done,’ says Jonny.
Their tor challenge gave Jonny an insight into his local landscape and geography, which he’d not really taken on board much before.
‘It was such an education to do this,’ he says. ‘Everyone says Dartmoor looks different every time, and it really does, every time. It may be a cliche, but there is nowhere like it and the light changes all the time.’
‘I feel like I’m more part of the landscape now,’ he adds. ‘My understanding and appreciation of the moors wasn’t there before. I can stand in a pub and talk to someone about Dartmoor now.’
As work came back, the friends’ walks became less frequent, but they have persisted and have currently reached a total of 77 tors.
‘It’s slowed down, but we have continued. And I like the fact that we don’t want it to end too quickly,’ says Jonny.
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