I spent the last weekend on Dartmoor, a group of us about fifteen of us staying in a camping barn near a little place (a few houses and a pub) called Manaton.

It's a long, long way away from Leeds. Taking the M62, picking up a passenger close to the M60 in Manchester, making our way down the M6 and then the entire length of the M5 took over seven hours. Nearer to the barn, well away from A class roads, we were greeted with faltering light and roads barely wider than the width of my car. Although driving on these roads were just a little stressful - especially when you're not really sure of where you're headed - the stark contrast from the normal roads I travel on did seem to provide a pretty fitting way to start the weekend.

The barn was spot on - spacious, toilets, shower, electric lighting and a seperate-ish area for sleeping. When we'd all arrived, we surveyed our food and drink provisions and figured we could probably stock a supermarket for a couple of weeks with them.

Over the course of the Saturday we covered about 12 miles walking across Dartmoor, taking in a few of the tors and climbing right to the top of a few of them. The promise of cold, windy and rainy conditions made sure that we all came prepared with the right kit but, while it was windy on top of the tors, I felt it could have been a lot worse. The rain only materialised once we'd stopped for our second break at about five o'clock and, although we had a few hours of walking back to the barn in the rain, it didn't seem to make much difference to the day.

I've not done that much walking in a day since I was a child, and the fact that I was able to do it pretty comfortably is due to the work that I've been putting in over recent months. Had we attempted the walk six months ago, I just wouldn't have been able to do it. I enjoyed this fact, enjoyed the walk - in fact I enjoyed everything about the entire weekend. Even managing to cover my car's back seat in beer dregs from bottles that we were recycling didn't really bother me... I'm sure that sort of thing would drive me bonkers most of the time.

I could write lots more about my barn weekend, but I've not really got the time now. I'm hoping I can follow this post up with some photographs in the future.