A walking guide to climbing all mountains in England over 2000ft

• Description
• Contents
• Introduction
• Sample Route

It was late afternoon and although it was windy and cold with snow still lying in drifts as we trudged up the Pennine Way towards Cross Fell the cloud was off the tops. Cross Fell however was not our objective but Long Man Hill, an insignificant and undistinguished mound to the north. This was our third and hopefully final attempt to determine precisely whether it met the criteria for inclusion. Twice the matter had been left in doubt with mist, low cloud and rain swirling in at the last moment frustratingly to blot out the view. Carefully we took the measurements. From above the broad flat peaty col Long Man Hill rose 53ft. It was in!  The total was at last complete;  432 summits in England and Wales.

Completing the ascent of all the mountains of England and Wales has been for a long time an ambition to which we looked forward, but it was not an objective with which we set out. It came rather as the goal of a task already partly achieved after many years in the hills. First it was all the two thousanders in Wainwright, then all the rest of his 214  Lake District tops and then more and more of the hills as we sought out fresh summits and explored new areas. But gradually it became apparent that the list from which we were working was sadly out of date. Not only were we finding unlisted summits, but others, often reached after  long approaches through bog and heather turned out to rise only  negligible amounts above their surroundings. A new list was certainly needed and after many hours spent in Manchester Central Reference Library poring over large scale maps we set out once again to visit all the tops. Wales was our first objective, one to which we returned eagerly each weekend and it was almost reluctantly that we descended from the last Welsh top and looked towards England. But if we missed Wales, the English mountains were old friends which we were glad to see again and among them was the added excitement of several new discoveries.

For us our last top was also a first; our first ascent of Pillar Rock. Just as Sir Hugh Munro’s tables of the 3000ft mountains of Scotland include but one summit requiring climbing skills, so it is fitting that the mountains of England and Wales should have one too. Pillar Rock, a magnificent tower of rock above Ennerdale in the Lake District, is a rock climb, one which we had left until last, not because it was difficult, but because it was the last summit in England to be attained by man, so too it would be ours.
While the year in which we began proved to be the wettest this century, the year that followed set records for the driest. Week after week the sun shone till the rivers and streams dwindled and vanished and wild camping on the hills was only possible after careful searching for the few tiny springs still flowing. Then almost within sight of completion there were yet more records with gales and storms that kept us frustrated in the valleys and on the penultimate top the map was torn from our hands by the wind and hurled across the moor into the distance.

Wind and rain, hail, snow and storm, the cold clear air of winter and the hazy heat of summer, have given us magnificent days and one collects memories as a store to be enjoyed at leisure: a calm December evening watching a glorious sunset on Dollywagon Pike, the sky streaked with red and gold and the sun setting in a blaze of fire behind Pillar; another day the sun breaking through the grey mist on the tops to show us the shimmering colours of our Glories on the clouds beneath; camping in an April blizzard on Crinkle Crags followed by a brilliantly clear day of sun, blue sky and and snow covered tops; submerging to our necks in a stream on the Coniston fells to escape the burning sun of the summer heatwave, and lastly a leisurely dinner with a bottle of wine on the summit of Ingleborough as we celebrated the final night of a backpack round all the mountains of Yorkshire.

There are dozens of hills that didn’t make it into our list simply because they lacked a few feet in height. It would be tempting to go below 2000ft, or perhaps to ignore height completely and just pick the ‘best’ mountains. But what is best? There are days when there is more enjoyment on the lowly fells than on the grandest of peaks and weather and seasons so colour one’s view that the best is never the same.

If it was not an objective with which we started, neither is it something which is ever finished. There are too many mountains ever to tire of repeating them, there are too many seasons ever to tire of the weather and there are too many wild and beautiful places ever to tire of exploration.