MISS Hope Bourne, author, artist and legend of Exmoor, has died at the age of 91.

She passed away on August 22, four days short of her 92nd birthday.

Having spent time in two hospitals and a residential home she finally ended her days where she wanted to be — at her home in Withypool on the edge of the moor.

She is best known for surviving on next to nothing, eking out a living from the wilds of Exmoor.

Her close friend Maggie Griffiths of Barnstaple said: "Hope lived most of her life on Exmoor but the place she loved most was at Ferny Ball, just above Sheldon Water."

It was where she kept a lovely garden, growing vegetables, fruit and flowers.

Maggie added: "Her home was a small shepherd's caravan (where she) felt she could be the person she wanted to be.

"(She was) very independent; she worked hard and walked the moors for her food which she obtained by shooting and fishing."

On a Friday she would visit Withypool Post Office to pick up her mail and any other goods she needed.

She spent many hours during the day sketching and writing.

Maggie said: "She endured many hardships, as one would living in such a wild and lonely place, but for all this she was a mine of information on any subject, be it Exmoor, politics or current affairs."

Hope's window on the world was a small radio.

Maggie who became friends with Hope six years ago after meeting her on Exmoor, said: "I will value all our times spent on the moors, having picnics, long conversations and much laughter.

"Exmoor won't feel the same for me now that she is gone but I believe she will always be walking the moors; we will have her presence with us forever."

Born in Hartland to a mother who was a teacher, Hope developed a deep respect for nature and wildlife, and spent 60 years of her life on Exmoor, occupying primitive cottages and later, the tiny caravan at Ferny Ball.

She survived by growing her own vegetables, drinking from a stream and shooting rabbits and pigeons for meat.

During the 1950s and 1960s, she claimed to live off just £5 a month, and had an annual income of about £100, earned through helping farming friends.

Her lifestyle was so frugal that she managed to save nearly half.

She kept bantam fowl and developed an extraordinary knowledge of the local flora and fauna.

She was well known for going on 20-mile walks without a map, using her own innate compass to find her way home.

She was also a keen foot follower of the hunt, and once described the activity as "the spirit of Exmoor, the pageant of the countryside".

Her colourful writing and the diary she kept of her extraordinary lifestyle eventually made it into print.

Her first book, Living On Exmoor, was published in 1963.

She later wrote A Little History of Exmoor (1968), Wild Harvest (1978) and My Moorland Year (1993).

She also contributed a regular column to the West Somerset Free Press, which was always submitted in handwritten pencil notes.

Her publications led to two documentaries, About Britain: Hope Bourne Alone on Exmoor (1978) and Hope Bourne — Woman of Exmoor (1981).

In an interview with The Telegraph magazine in 1979, she gave an insight into her life.

She said: "It's a good life but it's a tough life. You've got to be 100 per cent physically fit to live as I do. You've got to be tough, body and soul."