Twenty Two - Swansea - Mynydd y Betws (373m)

Betws Wind Farm

Turbines in low autumn sun

This one was monumentally boggy – it started off on a tidy little track but eventually you have no choice but to strike out across the tussocks - though it is quite impressive to be quite so up close to the bottom of the turbines up here. We also got to scramble around the ruins of the medieval castle of Penlle'r Castell.

Walking directly below a turbine

View from highest point

Twenty One - Essex - Chrishall Common (147m)

Footpath marker

Highest point is a clearing the
other side of the woodland

Corner of field a few metres ahead
is approximate highest point

Church at the start and finish of walk

Twenty - Cambridgeshire - Great Chishill (146m)

Village sign -
highest in the county

Locked gates - highest point is just
inside - water board covered reservoir

View from in front of locked gates -
flat farmland not exactly  a summit!

Nineteen - Cheshire - Shining Tor (559m)

Cast iron footpath sign - with the main "Cat &
Fiddle" trans-Pennine road behind.

Errwood Reservoir

Looking back towards Pym Chair. Stone wall
marks boundary between Cheshire (LHS)
 and Derbyshire (RHS)

Looking back to Cat Tor. Flagstones make
going across the peaty bog much easier.

Step through the gate from Derbyshire and into
Cheshire. Trig point at Shining Tor adjacent
to the highest point in Cheshire.

Yikes! - Fine sentiment, but hardly rolls of the tongue! 

Stone plaque on the wall of the (unfortunately
closed) Cat & Fiddle Inn.

Eighteen - Staffordshire - Cheeks Hill (Axe Edge) (520m)

First of two highest points reached today. A fairly short uninspiring slog across boggy marshland (wet feet within three minutes of setting off) - but at least its another county-high crossed off! Misty and grey, but dry. For the first time ever, Taffy our Border Terrier wasn't with us, which as it happens was lucky - as dogs aren't allowed across the heathland due to ground-nesting birds.

Start of footpath across the bog -
("No dogs allowed").

The high point for Staffordshire is against the county border with Derbyshire at the north-western edge of the Peak District. Featureless with exception of dry-stone walls, the intersection of which forms a sheep fold at the highest point in Staffs.

Highest point - a sheep fold - where the
county boundary walls intersect.

Seventeen - Gloucestershire - Cleeve Hill (330m)

Pringle sweater in waiting! Slightly
 surreal golf course with grazing sheep.

Well this was a slightly weird one. Called in on the way back from visiting family in Norfolk, and Cleeve Common is a lovely spot, with views down into Cheltenham with its racecourse, and across to the Malvern Hills. We parked next to the golf club and as we ascended we negotiated a golf course, sheep, park benches and mushrooms. The hill is also known as Cleeve Cloud.



Lifting heavy rain clouds. The view across
the Vale of Evesham to the Malverns

However, to get to the summit (330m), you bear south west, away from the views and across a somewhat scrubby looking plateau, past a car park and some transmitters and then to the rather hollow prize of a nondescript looking trig point. Having done this, we cut straight back in the direction of the golf club (lots more scenery and sunshine now), and back to the car.

Transmitters near the summit

Trig pillar by barb wire fence. Bit of an anti-
climax after such good views on the climb up

Sixteen - Somerset - Dunkery Beacon - Exmoor (519m)

National trust sign -
Start of climb up to the beacon

This was a pretty easy walk – not really “on our way” home from our trip to Devon, but we decided to fit it in anyway. At 519m, the views from the top are amazing, and the walk up there doesn’t prepare you for the fact that the Beacon overlooks the Bristol Channel and that most of the south coast of Wales can be seen sparkling (or smouldering , in the case of Port Talbot) in the distance.

Well defined path to the large
stone mound at the top

Plaque at the beacon

At the summit is a large and sturdy cairn, perfect for climbing, with a memorial plaque commemorating the donation of the Beacon to the National Trust in 1932.

View from the top across the Bristol
 Channel to the South Wales Coast