Meavy

Meavy is a small village on the south western edge of the moor, close to Burrator, where a green, a church and an inn stand together in a way that has changed very little. Its great distinction is the Meavy Oak, an enormous hollow tree on the green beside the church, held to be many centuries old and long the centre of village life and celebration. The church of St Peter stands beside it, and the two together make one of the most photographed corners of this part of Dartmoor.

The village sits within easy reach of Burrator Reservoir, whose wooded shores and quiet lanes are popular with walkers and cyclists, and beyond it the moor rises towards Sheeps Tor and Down Tor. The River Meavy, which gives the village its name, was dammed above here in the 1890s to supply Plymouth, drowning farms and fields that had been worked for generations. Meavy itself remains as it was, and the combination of the oak, the green and the church continues to draw people out from Plymouth on a fine afternoon.