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The Blackmore Vale is a vale, or wide valley, in North Dorset, and to a lesser extent South Somerset and southwest Wiltshire in southern England. The vale is part of the Stour valley. The vale is delimited by the Dorset Downs, a chalk ridge to the south; Cranborne Chase, chalk hills to the east; and the watershed between the Stour and Yeo valleys to the northwest (which generally follows close to the borders between North Dorset, South Somerset and West Dorset). The River Stour flows out of the vale at Blandford Forum in the southeast, a town sandwiched between the Dorset Downs and Cranborne Chase. The river flows into the vale north of Gillingham.
Panorama of the Blackmore Vale taken from Stalbridge. The hills in the background on the left are Duncliffe and Cranbourne Chase. To the right of centre is a single hill, Hambledon Hill, with Sturminster Newton in front. To the right are the Dorset Downs.
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The vale is Thomas Hardy's "Vale of the little dairies", and books including Tess of the D'urbervilles were set here; he also lived and wrote in Sturminster NewtonSturminster Newton known to locals as Stur is a town in the Blackmore Vale area of Dorset, England. The town is famous as the home of poet and author William Barnes, and for part of his life Thomas Hardy. The town had a population of 3,105 during the 2001 for a time. Poet William BarnesWilliam Barnes ( 1801 1886) was an English writer, poet, minister, and philologist. He was a friend of Thomas Hardy and Gerard Manley Hopkins. He is known for his Dorset dialect poems. Barnes had a strong interest in language; he was fluent in Greek, Lati also lived in Sturminster NewtonSturminster Newton known to locals as Stur is a town in the Blackmore Vale area of Dorset, England. The town is famous as the home of poet and author William Barnes, and for part of his life Thomas Hardy. The town had a population of 3,105 during the 2001. Douglas AdamsDouglas Noel Adams ( March 11, 1952 May 11, 2001) also known as Bop Ad or Bob after his illegible signature, or by his initials DNA was a British comic radio dramatist and author, most notably of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy HHGG . Education and e and Robert BoyleThe Honourable Robert Boyle ( January 25, 1627 December 30, 1691) was an Irish natural philosopher, noted for his work in physics and chemistry. Early years He was born at Lismore Castle, in the province of Munster, Ireland, as the seventh son and fourtee lived in Stalbridge for part of their lives.
Sturminster Newton watermillA watermill is a machine constructed by connecting a water wheel to a pair of millstones. Like windmills, watermills were a common system for milling flour until the arrival of steam and electrical power in the last two centuries. Strictly speaking, a pai.
Land use in the vale is predominantly dairyOxford, New York, July 2001 In many northern-hemisphere countries a dairy is a facility for the extraction and processing of animal milk (mostly from cows, sometimes from buffaloes or goats) for human consumption. The end product of such processes are kno farmingFarming, ploughing rice paddy, in Indonesia Agriculture is the process of producing food, feed, fiber and other desired products by cultivation of certain plants and the raising of domesticated animals (livestock). Agriculture is also known as farming ., with many small farms dotted accros the vale. Until it was closed in 1998 Sturminster Newton livestock market was the busiest weekly livestock market in Britain. There are also many small towns and villages in the vale:
Dorset
Valleys
