🏕️ Queen of The Tor

Storm's first ever wild camp

Hello Restless Ones,

I am back. Wahoooo! A big thanks to all of you for being so supportive in the need to take a break for the past month.

I’m tapping this post out from the Canary Islands, on a family holiday. It’s later than intended because I dished out a talk in a French castle this week, then had to jet home, collect the kids (Jamie had bundled them onto a train to Gatwick) and jet back out again. Madness.

Anywhoo, I managed to make some good headway with the plan for new books (yee haww!) and have decided that I’ll bring out Bedtime adventure Stories for Grown Ups: Vol II as the next read.

I did wonder whether you’d be interested in hearing about the behind the scenes process of pulling a book together? Let me know👇🏻

I also used the break to reassess a few things and, although I wondered how in the wooly-world I fit weekly newsletter writing into life (because life still seems full-brimmin’ without it 🤷🏼‍♀️), I very much missed my dedicated writing day each week. And the sense of connection to you all.

I’m glad to be back. So onwards we go!

Kicking you off with the tale of a mini adventure I had recently with my four-year-old gal, Storm.

Read or listen to it, as you like. Part II to follow on Thursday.

✌🏻Happy adventuring until then,

Anna xx

Queen of The Tor: Part I

It was late April and summer had officially arrived early. As a Brit in permanent denial about our changeable weather, I believed that, as Florence + The Machine put it, “the dark days are over,”. April was, therefore, the ideal time to unleash all the adventure plans I’d been storing up through winter.

I was overdue a catch up with my good friend Faye (of Llama Drama fame) so I messaged her to arrange a meetup.

‘Faye bomb - I miss thee! Send me some dates you’re free for a weekend visit. We could plan a wild camp and wander in Dartmoor?’

After the usual date-diary-dance, we settled on April 26th. So I followed up with:

‘Do you mind if I bring Storm? We could meet in the morning for something fun, then do her first wild camp EVA on the moor.

Good for the soul!

When she’s asleep, we can drink hot chocolate and put the world to rights.

Whaddya reckon?’

I’d been hoping to take Storm wild camping for a while now, but fear had got in the way. The previous year, I’d scouted out a wild camping spot near The Cotswold Way but my brain, riddled with sleep deprivation and the load of early motherhood, couldn’t quite seem to clamber over the towering jumble of imaginary what ifs?

What if someone comes by while we’re sleeping? What if an angry jobsworth type reports us for sleeping wild, illegally? What if something (anything) happens and I can’t protect her – she’s so little, after all.

Wild camping had never been a problem before. I’d slept wild on hilltops, in woods and by rivers dozens of of times before having kids. I’d even started a mini-campaign online to encourage others to wild camp. And so, these new, unwelcome thoughts were frustrating.

A part of me felt embarrassed. Social media wanted to tell me that because I am an adventurous spirit, I should find it easy to take my kid outdoors. I should sleep on mountaintops, overlaying bold captions on snappy video reels — detailing how outside is the best place for them.

And yet, we stayed at home.

Because getting a full night of unbroken sleep, indoors, felt like enough of a mountain conquered for now.

Rather than push through the fears, I parked them for a while, reasoning that I’d wild camp with Storm when my nervous system had the energy to hack it.

A year later, fear had piped down. Everyday life was easier and with a meetup with Faye now arranged, it was the right time to take Storm out for her first night under the stars.

In the lead up to our Dartmoor rendezvous, I checked my weather app daily, and I soon learned that the British weather had deceived me. Despite the early April sunshine extravaganza, rain and thunderstorms were now forecast.

I’m a firm believer in spending time outdoors, whatever the weather, and I do love a good rainy hike or run. But, for this, Storm’s first ever wild camp, I had high hopes of us three gals, sitting out the front of our tents, cooking up a noodle dinner as the sun went down — Faye and me watching clouds drift across the horizon and Storm running around as she pleased. All of which would be tricky in the rain.

Come Friday morning Storm and I were on the road by 9am, bombing it down the M5 in our hire car, a sparkly teal coloured Fiat 500. Both of us were excited about the prospect of a girl’s adventure, albeit for different reasons.

I was looking forward to the camping, the Great Outdoors and spending quality time with Faye and Storm. Storm was excited about stopping at a service station, getting a hot chocolate and the opportunity to listen to a SpongeBob Squarepants audiobook en route.

‘Mumma…’ said Storm, taking a break from SpongeBob.

‘Yes poppet?’

‘I just love this car. Is it our car now, just for our adventures?’

‘Sadly not — we have to give it back, but we can hire it again if you like it?’

‘I’d like that,’ she smiled.

‘What shall we name it then, the car I mean?’ I caught sight of Storm in the rear-view mirror. She had her thinking face on. There was a pause.

‘Rainbow Sparkle.’

And so me, Storm and Rainbow Sparkle headed South West. Watching the world whizz by the window, her alternating between questions on how being a queen ‘worked’, and whether she could be a queen one day? Before we discussed, frequently, how many minutes remained until we made it to the service station for a long awaited hot chocolate.

Wanting to make the most of our girls’ day out, I’d arranged to meet Faye at Plymouth Aquarium. Not only could we kill a few hours marvelling at octopi, jellyfish and sharks, but ‘Auntie Faye’ (as the co-founder of Outreach Paramedics) had arrived in her ambulance. On top of that, she’d also brought her two dogs, Molly and Rudy, along for the adventure. A ‘nee-naw’ and dogs to play with? Storm was in heaven.

In the lead up to the trip, both Faye and I had said that we would do some research on where the best wild camp spot would be. We needed to cross-reference which areas of the park were legal for us to camp in, with a Tor which had a carpark nearby, so that the walk was do-able for little legs.

Me being me, and Faye being Faye, we’d both tumbled into our meet up having not done our homework. Not to fear — ice cream to the rescue. After getting Storm a scoop of bubblegum flavour, we plonked ourselves down at the aquarium cafe for a last-minute plan-a-thon, then settled on a camp at Great Mis Tor. Four Winds carpark was on the road just below it, so we could leave the cars there overnight and heff it 1.5 miles up the hill to sleep.

‘There’s only one problem,’ I said as Storm scraped out the last of her ice cream from the tub.

‘What’s that?’

‘I forgot the cheese.’

‘The cheese?’

‘For sprinkling on our noddle dinner.’

‘Oh, that won’t do.’ Faye shook her head.

‘I know. Dinner just isn’t dinner unless it has cheese on it.’

So we did a two-mile round trip to a local supermarket for cheese and it was only when we arrived back at the car, that I wondered whether adding a such a walk through suburbia to a Tor hike was going to be too much for Storm’s wee legs to handle.

Only time would tell.

At 4pm, we bundled into our respective adventure wagons and set off from Plymouth, bound for Dartmoor.

The first spots of rain pattered onto the windscreen just as we left the city and I muttered a quiet ‘oh shit’ under my breath before assuring myself that it was just a passing shower. We still had 17 minutes left to drive until we made the base camp carpark. Surely the rain would have passed by then? Or we would pass through it?

I decided not to comment on the rain. Just because it was potentially an issue in my mind, I didn’t want to make it one for Storm. I’d collected many experiences of camping in the cold and wet over 40 years of life — there was no need to dump those experiences on her. She had plenty of time to gather her own.

Instead, I switched on the windscreen wipers and stayed quiet.

As we turned off the main road at Tavistock and headed across the moor, I remembered why I love Dartmoor so much; it’s an other worldly place. Characterised by rolling open land dotted with clusters of ancient granite boulders. There were very few buildings in sight, just the horizon on both sides of the road, and my view split 50/50 between the grey of the sky and a blanket of sage, straw and earthy brown.

It was still raining as we turned into the carpark. While I set about unpacking the kit from the boot, Storm climbed out of her seat and then paused for a moment. She looked up and opened her palms to the sky.

‘Hey Mum.’

‘Yes?’

‘It’s raining.’

‘Is it?’ I feigned surprise.

‘Yeah. It’s going to sound lovely, going pitter patter on our tent.’ She said, and I smiled.

The rain was heavier now, and it was the cold, sideways kind of rain. So, rather than decide what layers to put Storm in, I simply put her in all of them. Experience had taught me that a cold kid is an unhappy kid. I’d rather gently bake her on the slopes of the moor than have her teeth chatter.

On went underclothes, waterproof trousers, a down jacket, a raincoat and a woolly hat. The only thing I’d failed to think about was wellies, so her feet were going to get wet. But hey, you can’t win at everything.

Storm spotted a few ponies grazing in an area behind the carpark, so while she went over to say ‘hello’ to them, Faye and I discussed the route up to the top of Great Mis Tor. It was barely visible through the blanket of drizzle and early on in the discussion we spotted another, closer Tor on the opposite side of the road.

‘McNuff, are you thinking what I’m thinking?’

‘Sod Great Mis and let’s go up that closer one instead?’

‘Yep.’

‘Done.’

And so off we went, Storm none the wiser about the change of plan and now bound for the top of King’s Tor — which, given Storm’s recent line of questioning about whether she was eligible to become queen seemed like a neat fit.

After a long drive and an active morning, I had some concerns that Storm’s energy levels would wane before we reached the top. But within a few minutes of watching her, those fears disappeared. I needn’t worry about her walking to the top of the Tor because she was, in fact, running up it — chasing the tails of Molly and Rudy along the trail, screeching with laughter as she went.

There is nothing more beautiful than watching your kid run about wild and free, in the outdoors. Doing her own thing, in deep commune with the moor and the dogs, entirely lost in the moment.

As an adult, we spend so much of our lives trying to claw our way back into the present. To see her firmly locked into that present, was everything I could want for her childhood. Long may she stay there, I thought.

With Storm immersed in the joy of a pooch-led ascent to the summit, Faye and I had time to chat. Squelching over spongy grass and past bursts of yellow-flowering gorse, we covered all the usual catch-up topics; How’s your mum? / brother / dad / work? In between the chatting, we enjoyed the silence — as only good friends can do. We listened to the light tinkle of the rain, the gentle whir of wind through nearby grass, the twittering of birds we could hear but not see.

Far from resenting the rain, I was now grateful for it because it made the climb even more exciting for Storm. She enjoyed deviating from the trail to walk along the bed of several small streams, putting her arms out as she went, as if the wild rush of the 3cm of water might knock her from her feet.

When we came to stream that was deep, cold and large enough to warrant stepping stones, Faye and I threw the bags over one at a time then passed Storm from one bank to the other.

According to Storm, it wasn’t a stream but in fact a MASSIVE river. She felt a sense of triumph at having got across it. ‘Mum! Mum! Take a photo.’ she said as she made it to the other side.

Which made me smile, because wanted to capture a memory of her first river crossing and then sad that she was mimicking what us adults do, which is to take (many) photos of anything that’s vaguely noteworthy.

As we got closer to the top, we came across more and more granite boulders perched on top of one another, each collection with its own set of nooks and crannies.

The dogs moved in and out of the rocks, finding tunnels I didn’t even know were there. Storm tried to channel her inner Jack Russell and follow them, but each time she had to backtrack and go around the rock instead, rushing to catch them up as they darted toward the next set.

Towards the top of the Tor the trail steepened until we were now climbing the rocks like steps. I was just beginning to wonder where we’d find a place flat enough to pitch our tent when, as if my magic, a small plateau appeared, just beneath the summit.

‘Well, would you look at that!’ I said to Faye

‘Oh, amazing.’ She replied.

It was big enough for both of our tents, slightly sheltered from the wind and with a 180 degree view of the surrounding landscape.

Part II coming soon…

👆🏻❤️ P.S Tapping the heart icon at the top or bottom of this post means that more people will see it. It also sends magical good vibes through the ether. ✨