The Hills is Lonely... or Are They?
Updated: Aug 6
How busy are/were the Scottish Mountains?
Between 1959 and 1978 a lady under the name of Lillian Beckwith wrote a light hearted series of books about life on the Hebrides. The first was called “The Hills is Lonely” and then came “The Sea for Breakfast”. They make an amusing read about life on the Islands. Check out ebay!
I have borrowed the title, as its a good title for what I wish to write about...and if it sells a few more books for her publishers then I will be surprised, but, all well and good!
My topic for today, is about the density of walkers you may come across on the Scottish Hills.
It includes some observations from 1980 up to around 2016. There are however massive holes. As I kept no record for the pre 1988 years, and my own records only include my own expeditions, and these stayed firmly away from the summer months, when many readers may have come to a different conclusion.
Nevertheless I believe and hope that my meagre observations may provide some indication of reality between 1976 and 2016. But first a question...
How do YOU feel when you meet others on the hill?
Are you just pleased to see others of a like mind, someone to compare notes and routes with, someone to share the solitude with, the atmosphere, the challenge of attaining high tops?
Or do you slow down, and make a small detour to avoid any contact, muttering about “bloody tourists”.
Maybe it depends on your mood at the time, but I guess that many walkers, especially lone walkers, love to have all of the hills to themselves all of the time and, whilst meeting the odd lone sole is just about acceptable, meeting a large party of, say, 10-20 feels a bit intrusive.
Naturally, if you are in that large party then you are just delighted to be there in the company of others you know, and the odd bod you meet now and then is neither hear nor there.
Personally (and naturally, being “Normal”) I have mixed feelings. I rarely walk alone and am most at home with just a few others (Usually 2 or three).
Whilst having the security and friendship of a few, I often do in fact walk much of the day on my own given that we all walk at different paces. You see more and hear more and get closer to nature.
You also avoid having to listen to 25 different ailments, films that are circulating, domestic issues, political issues and the general detritus of the artificial life we tend to live at home. I think I can describe it as FREEDOM!
Now, having waffled for a page or so, let me be a bit more precise about what I mean by counting the number of “people on a hill”.
Counting Criteria
My criteria for recording numbers has been that if you meet anyone who appears to be attempting to climb the same hill then, wherever you meet them, they count. It would, after all, be pointless to just count those who you actually met at the summit.
Equally it would be unfair to count someone on the car park who is merely spectating, scenery gazing, or giving the dog 5 minutes exercise.
I tend not to count an empty car either, unless I see the occupants actually ascending or descending in the distance. So, I count just people I actually see on the hill. People just setting off or returning count! So, hopefully, I have cleared up the question, with little room for doubt.
Actually, this whole debate is a bit sad really. But as an anorak (and an Accountant), I do like to try to be precise.
Scaling Numbers
The numbers of people attempting the Munros, Corbetts, Long Distance Walks, or just rambling generally in the Great Outdoors is, I think fairly evidently, at an all time high.
A walker and writer called Dave Hewitt did an amazing analysis of Munro compleations (traditional Munroist spelling), month by month, year by year.
This shows, for example, that in the 10 years of the 1950s, only 21 compleations were recorded. In the 1970s it was 122, in the 1980s (my era) 580 compleations, with a big rise in the era 2000-2010 to 2150, (look it up on the net!).
My own personal compleation number in 1988 was Munroist No. 604, yet by the end of 2025, the number of people who have climbed all the Munros exceeded 8,200!
Does this mean that you have to join a queue at every summit? Far from it!!
There are a few of the Hills that will obviously always be busy. Ben Nevis, Cairngorm, Ben Lomond, Ben Lawers being some.
You may have seen horror film of the highest peak in Wales, Snowdon, with people queuing for some time to access the summit via steps.
The highest mountain in England, Scafell Pike, can also have its moments. If you aim for a famous hill, or are near a centre of population... then you can expect company, unless you go out of season, at dusk or dawn, in bad weather, or when some big event is on TV!
Even Everest has its moments and problems.
But come on folks, there are over 1000 Scottish Hills to choose from.
The Counting Context
After 1988, with the Munros done, our small team of 3 or 4 did the Munro Tops, the Corbetts, the Donalds, the “Other Hills” and a goodly number of Grahams.
Apart from some factors mentioned above, there are a number of reasons that could possibly have affected the number of people we met.
What months did we usually walk? Did we use main paths? Did we walk weekends or midweek? What weather did we walk in?
Generally we missed January, July, August, and December, and took the most direct approach.
We made 3 or 4 trips per annum, usually for 4 days, but usually also including a full autumn week each year.
We walked whatever the weather and conditions. Barely a single day failed to produce a summit. On the Munros we had only one day with no summit. We had been lucky to survive.
Some way through the Munros I started to routinely record the count of people on the hills. We were next entirely dedicated to the single minded aim of "doing the Corbetts”. So I have a full record for those.
Statistics for The Corbetts
Not being as popular as the Munros, you would expect The Corbetts to be less frequented. In truth, they certainly were, because they could not have been much less frequented than they were!
It took us 167 days on the hill to complete the full round of 224 Corbetts (including some promotions into the category). During that time we met only 141 people.
This averages out at less than one person per day, and considerably less than one person per Corbett.
In actual fact it was even more sparsely populated than that!!
On an amazing 184 Corbetts we saw not a single soul
That's 82% of the mountain to ourselves
On another 24 Corbetts we met either 1 or 2 people
That's another 10% almost people free
This leaves us with just 16 Corbetts out of 224 on which we saw more than 2 people. In fact, on these 16, we saw no less than 113 people! (80%)
The busiest five Corbetts were:
Ben Tarsuinn (Arran)
The Cobbler (Arrochar)
Ben Vrachie (Near Pitlochry)
Clisham on the Isle of Harris and
Ben Rhinnes (Dufftown) where the whole local population seemed to be out for a Sunday stroll!
These five Hills produced 41% of all the people we saw on all the Corbetts!
Context for Further Statistics covering The Munros, Munro Tops, Donalds and the 'Other Hills' listed in Munro's Tables: 1999-2013
We finished the Corbetts in 1999 and immediately transferred our attention to the 116 (out of nearly 230) Munro Tops that we had not yet visited.
These were the subsidiary peaks of the Munros. If you examine the list of people who have compleated the Munros you will find that only about 20% of the first 1000 and 10% of the next 750 went on to do a full round of the Munro Tops (approximately 10% overall to date, according to Anne Butler, President of Mountaineering Scotland, on Facebook.
I find this strange really as they are a great challenge in their own right. They also cover much of Scotland's high ground that is not covered by an ascent of the Munros. On many of these “Tops” we added a repeat visit to the “Munro” itself.
We also added the final “Other Hills” and the first half of the 90 Donalds. These were finished later.
During this 14 year period my team comprised the same 3 (myself, Ian Holland & Malcolm Newlyn), with the brilliant addition, from 2007, of my son, David, and the occasional guest friend such as Dave Hill, Dave Southern, Geraldine Newlyn, Peter Bevan.
Passing the age of 60, and then 70, and being the eldest team member, things were slowing down, and it was great to have someone to carry my flask!
I write this in 2025 when, at 86, even a humble Graham is a bit of a struggle. Naismith's rule (look it up) is out of the window.
My most recent repeat Munros were in October 2024, Carn an Tuirc. At 5 miles and 1800ft it took all day, about 7 hours. Then, previously, in 2022, Ben Lawers from the upper car park.
I digress, but then when you write things at 86 you are allowed to... Normal Neville's Rules! Going slower, does that mean we would meet more or less people? We covered less ground but were there for longer!
Statistics for the years 1999-2013
On 203 Hills (76%) we saw not a sole.
This is not a lot different from the empty hills 1988-1999 (82%).
A breakdown of the 203 hills is shown below.
Note: our trips did not include January, July, August, December.
So, even half the Munros were lonely.
The Munro Tops shows a high figure of 80% when no one else was seen. This would seem to support the theory that Munro Baggers do not, as a whole, mop up all the tops as they go.
The “Other Hills” and particularly the Donalds at 96% score highly for their emptiness. Though, admittedly, we did these largely from September to November.
So up to 2013 there was still plenty of empty space on the Scottish Mountains! And despite the increasing attraction it thankfully still feels today, that most of the Big Hills is Indeed Lonely!
Normal Neville (NN)
Please scroll right down to 'like' or rate this article. It might look like you need to enter your email address but you don't need to. The interaction spurs me on to keep blogging! Thank-you.
Fascinating facts and reassuring to know there's still a chance to escape to freedom!! 😄