Blackmoor Gate, the western gateway to Exmoor National Park, sits on the watershed between tributaries of the rivers Yeo and Heddon nearly 305m (1000 ft) above sea level. It has long been a crossing of tracks – an ancient ridgeway following the former moorland ridge from the heights of Exmoor down to the sea at Mortehoe. The road from Lynton to Barnstaple crosses here at a low point of the ridge, as did the former Lynton & Barnstaple Railway.