HILL walker Jeff Kent has become the first person ever to identify and climb all Central England’s 633 1,000ft peaks, nine years after he set out on his mission.

He has named them collectively as The Kents, in honour of his countryside-loving parents, Cyril and Helen. 

Jeff has reached the tops of all the 1,000ft hills and mountains of Worcestershire, Shropshire, Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, Cheshire, Staffordshire and Derbyshire.

His total includes, of course, several peaks in the Malvern Hills range, as well as Herefordshire Beacon, although he had to give Bredon Hill a pass, as that comes in 19ft under the threshold.

He climbed a record 500th 1,000ft English peak, the impressive, rocky-topped Win Hill, back in July 2019; his total in England now stands at 682 and he has been photographed on the tops of all the hills and mountains to prove his achievements.

Sue Bell, Jeff’s partner and photographer, has joined him on all his climbs.

Nevertheless she left a number of awkward precise summits for Jeff to tackle alone, not least the dramatic Tower at Alport Castles (the unstable largest landslip in Britain), Henley Nap (the top of which was on a bees’ nest) and The Battle Stones rock stack on snow-covered Willstone Hill (where Jeff developed exposure).

Jeff, aged 70, said: “I’m aiming to climb 1,000 of England’s 1,000ft peaks before even considering retiring from hill bagging!”

 

 

 

Jeff Kent’s Central England’s 1,000-Foot Peaks, the fifth in his series of books on England’s 1,000ft peaks, is available in bookshops, on Amazon and (as signed copies) through his website at https://www.witancreations.com