Blog from the bog

 Have you ever tried bog swimming?  Well I can heartily recommend it.  We set off for Taw Marsh from Belstone, on the northern side of Dartmoor, in search of a ford where the river bends and there is apparently quite a large pool.   Well there's not been much rain in the last few months and when we got there the pool was, ahem, quite shallow. The river then meandered enticingly into the distance towards the mountains through reeds and flowers so after a bit of wallowing in the pool we decided to follow it upstream.   We felt like explorers going up a minuscule version of the Amazon.   We half swam, half crawled along, at nose level with the bank, the reeds, the spagnum moss and the odd foxglove....totally immersed in the boggy environment.  At this point I remembered I'd read somewhere there were leeches here.  Oh well, too late to worry now.   We carried on and then came to a deeper bit where we had another wallow, miniswim and chat, before pushing on into the heart of darkness (well that's what it felt like).  We were effectively swimming in a bog, but you have to remember this is not just any bog, it's a clean, clear, Dartmoor bog.