I'm a Bagger!

Last year, I was on a guided walk put on by the North Pennines AONB team, taking in three Nuttalls, including Little Fell, Tinside Rigg and Long Fell. These fells fall within the Warcop Army Training zone and access to them is not permitted, except on the annual guided walk put on by the North Pennines team. Whilst in the car park, awaiting our walk to start, I was approached by one of the other attendees, a tall thin man who looked to be in his late sixties. After some small talk, he outlined his rationale for attending the walk. "I'm a bagger!" he quipped, with a smile on his face and a glint in his eye. 

There is no official definition of what a bagger is. The man I spoke to meant that he visits the summits of hills and mountains and tries to "bag" each summit within a particular classification. I'll say more about some of these classifications shortly. But you do not need to walk hills to be a bagger: you could bag other natural features, for instance, a plan to walk the entire length of England's rivers, or something completely unrelated to the outdoors (a plan to visit every Wetherspoons, for example). 

I am a bagger, particularly of hills and mountains. Baggers can get a bad rap. There is that stereotype of one who marches up to the top of the fell only to place their hand on the trig point without any appreciation of their surroundings, but solely to say they have ticked off that particular summit. I am not one of those baggers and I suspect few are. Yes, I do have a list of hills I have summited. And yes, I do sometimes choose to walk a fell because I want to tick it off my list. But that is not remotely my main reason for climbing fells. I do it because I love being outdoors and bagging the summit is a secondary source of satisfaction - as well as an interesting project to monitor when I am not passing the time away among the mountains. 

What Am I Bagging? 

There are various ways to classify mountains and hills. Classifications are human inventions and there is always a degree of arbitrariness to them. I will not go into all the classifications here, but will mention some of the main ones I am chasing. The Nuttalls are mountains that are at least 2000 ft and have a prominence of 15 metres or above within England and Wales. These were compiled by John and Anne Nuttall. This benchmark of 2000 ft is often (though not by everyone) taken as the threshold for a peak being classed as a mountain. 

Most people with an interest in hill walking will have heard of Alfred Wainwright, the illustrator and guide book writer most known for his Lakeland guides. The list of "Wainwright" fells, which amount to 214, are those to which Wainwright dedicates a chapter within his seven volume pictorial guide books to the Lakes. This is the sole criterion for being a Wainwright. Consequently, a fell need not be of a particular height or prominence to be included, it simply needs to have occupied a chapter in one of those seven guide books. Naturally, some hills will occupy several classifications. For instance, Helvellyn is both a Nuttall and a Wainwright. But you can have peaks, including within the Lake District, that are one but not the other. This obviously applies to the many Wainwright fells whose summits are below 2000ft, which thereby fail to qualify as Nuttalls. But there are also Lakeland fells above 2000ft which Wainwright did not write a chapter on, such as Ill Crag, near Scafell Pike. Another example is Striding Edge on Hellvellyn. Striding Edge is discussed in Wainwright's chapter on Helvellyn, but Hellvellyn is the subject of the chapter, and therefore "The Wainwright." However, since Striding Edge is over 2000ft, with a prominence of over 15 metres, it is, in and of itself, a Nuttall. 

This isn't strictly speaking where the Wainwright bagging ends though. The main Wainwrights are those featured in one of the following seven pictorial guides: The Northern Fells, The North Western Fells, The Western Fells, The Southern Fells, The Central Fells, The Eastern Fells, and The Far Eastern Fells. But there is a separate list of "Outlying Wainwrights" that are described in his book The Outlying Fells of Lakeland, which fall outside of the heart of the Lake District. Many of these are fairly small and quite easy to bag, such as Orrest Head, just outside of Windermere, which is where Wainwright acquired his passion for fell walking. 

Munros are another popular category. These are the mountains in Scotland whose summits are over 3000 feet. I have only done one: Ben Nevis. Naturally, given its height, Ben Nevis features in several other lists. For instance, it is a County Top, being the highest point within the county of Inverness-Shire. It is the highest point of the British Isles, but also one of the national three peaks along with Scafell Pike in England and Snowdon in Wales. 

Let's return to Nuttalls for a second. Some have suggested that the Nuttall classification is too liberal. Requiring a prominence of only 15 metres, many of the Nuttall peaks have a short relative height compared to nearby peaks. The Hewitt classification is less generous, requiring a prominence of 30 metres. The Marilyn classification refers to hills of any height with a prominence of 150 metres. This list was compiled by Alan Dawson, its name in homage to the forename of a Hollywood star whose surname resembles mountains in Scotland above the height of 3000ft. 

So these are some of the classifications hill baggers chase. They are by no means comprehensive. Indeed, the above only apply within the British Isles (although Marilyns apply to Ireland too), some even more locally. Indeed, anyone can create their own classifications (I might want to climb every fell with a tarn or a monument on it, or something even more niche). By my calculation, I have summitted 1 Munro, 39 Wainwrights, close to 20 outlying Wainwrights, about 30 Nuttalls, and I am yet to work out how many Marilyns. Still enough left to occupy me for at least the next 30 years or so...