Kinder Scout

Kinder is a plateau rather than a peak, about eight square kilometres of blanket peat at around 630 metres with no true summit, cut by groughs, the deep drainage channels in the peat that make crossing it slow and disorienting in mist. Gritstone tors stand along the edges, weathered into shapes with names like the Woolpacks and Pym Chair. Kinder Downfall, the highest waterfall in the Peak at about thirty metres, blows back on itself in a strong westerly and sends spray upward, visible for miles; in cold winters it freezes into an ice climb. The Pennine Way starts at Edale and takes its first steps up onto this plateau. Access to the moor was restricted for grouse shooting into the twentieth century and was opened following a long campaign in which a mass walk onto the plateau in 1932 became the best-known episode.

What you actually see

• Kinder Downfall - a thirty-metre fall that blows back uphill in a westerly.
• The groughs - peat channels that make the plateau slow going and confusing.
• The edge tors - weathered gritstone at the Woolpacks and Pym Chair.
• The Pennine Way start - the first climb of the long route, out of Edale.

When to go

May to September for the clearest conditions; the plateau is genuinely serious in winter, with deep snow in the groughs. The Downfall is at its most dramatic in a strong west wind after rain.

Honest expectations

Navigation on the plateau is difficult in cloud, with no landmarks and paths that vanish in peat; map and compass skills matter and mountain rescue is called out here regularly. The ground is wet and boots come out black. Jacob's Ladder and the Edale approaches are steep.

Nearby

Edale sits below to the south; Mam Tor and the Hope valley lie beyond it.