Cullever Steps

Cullever Steps is a crossing of the East Okement River on the north moor, below Belstone Tor. The river divides here, and the Ordnance Survey 25 inch maps of the 1880s and of 1902 to 1905 name the place beside a ford and a line of stepping stones across each of the two branches, a little above where the Black-a-ven Brook joins. Dartefacts gives earlier names: Crovenor Steps, Corner Ford Steps and Cullaford Steps.

The steps are a named point on the old boundary of the Forest of Dartmoor. Accounts of the boundary agree that from Cullever Steps it ran straight back to the summit of Cosdon, and Irishman's Wall, built in an attempt to enclose the Forest against Belstone Common, lies on that line.

The army road now crosses the river here on two concrete bridges, one over each branch, with clear spans of about 4 m and 5.7 m, so the stones are not needed to get across. The place has a military history: in June 1912 the howitzers of a Royal Artillery exercise were sited at Cullever Steps, firing across to Dinger Tor, and a concrete telephone safe and War Department boundary stones stand nearby. The Okehampton firing range lies close by, so check the published firing times before you go.

A Bronze Age ring cairn lies about 240 m to the south-east, and a pool used by wild swimmers is a short way downstream. Henry's Ford, the next crossing about a kilometre upstream, is the one that is passable on stones in low water; when it is in spate walkers come down to Cullever Steps instead.