Unusual summit features

[UpAndDownMountains]

Which ones exist? Natural or man-made, e.g. cairns, shelters, distinctive rocks.


Mynydd Tal-y-Mignedd, Snowdonia (on the Nantlle Ridge) - obelisk, perhaps 5 metres

Glyder Fach, Snowdonia - balancing cantilever stone

Tryfan, Snowdonia - "Adam and Eve"; two tall standing stones

Thornthwaite Crag, Lake District - tall stone beacon/column, perhaps 4 metres

Red Pike (Wasdale), Lake District - "The Chair"; a large cairn shaped like a chair, at the southern end

Haystacks, Lake District - Innominate Tarn

Hallin Fell, Lake District - large cairn, originally 12ft

Nine Standards Rigg, Yorkshire Dales - nine tall cairns


No links unfortunately, so you'll have to search for info/photos. I had originally drafted this post with links to the mountains in this site's hills directory, plus some of the walk reports. For some reason I'm no longer allowed to open the saved draft - I think it might be due to the links. Fortunately the back button worked and I didn't lose all my work.

[Fife Flyer]

Photo from yesterday - summit of Colt Hill near Moniaive.

[WalkWithWallace]

We've got the Cairnwell.

[rockhopper]

Mam Sodhail - large hollow summit cairn which you can reach by climbing up the outside

[Coop]

The very tall thin cairn near the summit of Carn an Fhreiceadain. I dong know how that's still standing

[dav2930]

Yr Wyddfa - cafe and railway station.

[nigheandonn]

There are a couple of hills in the Lake District where someone has stuck metal posts into the cairns, so that they look a bit like a bonfire of pitchforks. Starling Dodd is one, I think, the other is somewhere round Kentmere.

[HalfManHalfTitanium]

There are a couple of hills in the Lake District where someone has stuck metal posts into the cairns, so that they look a bit like a bonfire of pitchforks. Starling Dodd is one, I think, the other is somewhere round Kentmere.

The other one with the metal posts in the cairn is Harter Fell

Here's a few random others I've seen
Stiperstones - quartzite rich formations including 'Devil's Chair"
White Nancy on Kerridge Hill
Castell Dinas Bran - castle on top of the hill
Moel Famau, Ben Lawers - remains of summit monuments
The Cobbler, Helm Crag, Stac Pollaidh summit rocks (and obviously, In Pin, which I've not been to!)
Cadair Idris, Foel Grach - summit shelters
Yorkshire 3 Peaks - I recall some carvings on these summits, depicting fossils
Arenig Fawr, Great Carrs - air crash memorials
Glas Tulaichean - two concrete "pillows" (presumably unused cement for the trig, which set inside its sacks)
Hoad Hill, Breidden, Stoodley Pike - memorial obelisks
Carn Menyn - source of the Stonehenge bluestones
Dartmoor and Cairngorms tors, also some tor-like summit formations in the Carneddau such as Yr Aryg and Bera Mawr, and on the westernmost of the Nantlle Ridge (can't remember its name)
Mynydd Carningli, Yr Eifl, Carrock Fell - Iron Age (I think) forts
Castle Crag - quarry on summit
Great Gable - war memorial on summit
The Four Stones, Clent - folly in the form of a stone circle
Bronze Age cairns on the summits of many hills - Carneddau especially
On Lickey Hills there used to be a number of wind-powered instruments (aeolian harps etc) but they have gradually distintegrated
Mad Meg's Cairn on Creag Meagaidh

Tim

[HalfManHalfTitanium]

Oops I forgot to mention one of my favourites - the High Pike bench.

According to Wainwright, the bench replaced a fancy wrought iron seat, after a sheep had to be disentangled from it.

The bench has an inscription “In memory of Mick Lewis who loved all these fells" - which, as Wainwright said "is a nice thing to say about anyone".

Not got a photo of it, so here is one of my daughter and the Great Gable summit memorial instead.

[allanglens]

The very tall thin cairn near the summit of Carn an Fhreiceadain. I dong know how that's still standing

Remember seeing that - I thought the stones had been cemented in place!

[Sgurr]

Ben More Mull has a big metal pole in the cairn. Used to think it interfered with my compass, but now think it could be the rocks.

Toubkal has a sort of pyramidal climbing frame on the summit which people see, to use to hang upside down.

Sorry, pre-digital and I don't have photos of Ben More

There is a Vanessa trig on Sguman Cointich where the concrete has worn off the base leaving 2 metal supports (Photo stolen from weasel master

[simon-b]

Nobody seems to have mentioned Ben Nevis' summit shelter yet! Too obvious maybe, but it would probably be considered unusual on any other hill.

Foel Grach in Snowdonia has a bothy unusually close to the summit for a 3000 footer.

In the Lake District, there's a curious ditch on top of Hart Side and a peculiar mound at the summit of Sallows.

[cantabrigian]

There's the strange "aerial" at the top of Ben Stack.

[Broggy1]

There are loads. Many of them already mentioned.

Bink Moss in the North Pennines used to have a pair of wellies on a stick - it's been documented in the past more than once but not sure if they are still there now or not.

Whoap in the lake District has a very random singular boulder.

Ward's Stone in the Bowland Hills has a Trig Point on each end of the summit.

[Wellman77]

What about the 3 brethren near Yarrowford.