| Self catering Dartmoor |  |
| |  | | The Garden Flat self catering holiday accommodation Dartmoor Devon | |
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The DartmoorNational Park covers over 368 square miles of moorland and it has a population of approximately 33,400 with millions visiting it every year. It has been a National Park since 1951. Over half of the Dartmoor National Park is private land - much of it owned by the Duchy of Cornwall (Prince of Wales), the Ministry of Defence owns 14%, water companies own 3.8%, National Trust owns 3.7%, the Forestry Commission owns 1.8%, the Dartmoor National Park Authority owns 1.4% and 37% is common land.
Dartmoor is known for its tors, large hills topped with outcrops of granite which are usually rounded boulder-like formations. There are over 160 tors on Dartmoor and probably the best known one is Haytor.
There are many archeological sights and antiquities on Dartmoor. The majority of the prehistoric remains on Dartmoor date back to the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age periods. Many standing stones, stone circles, cairns and stone rows are found on Dartmoor and it is estimated that 5000 hut circles still remain today.
Letterboxing has long been a pursuit on Dartmoor and is becoming increasingly popular. Watertight containers (letterboxes) are hidden throughout Dartmoor, each containing a visitor book and rubber stamp. A Victorian era walker wrote book stating that a Dartmoor guide placed a bottle for visitors cards at Cranmere Pool on the Northern Moor in 1854. This is believed to be the origin of letterboxing.
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