In August 2024, British mountaineering stalwart Sir Chris Bonington turned 90. He celebrated in typical style with his family and friends by hiking up to the local summit of High Pike, an unassuming fell in the English Lake District’s quiet Northern Fells. High Pike is a hill characterized by Herdwick sheep, grass and rounded slopes – a far cry from the granite spires, mighty glaciers and terrifying walls of sheer rock and ice that made Bonington so famous, but his love for the great outdoors clearly still endures to this day.
We asked one of our mountaineering experts to delve into the life of Bonington, a man who was at the centre of a golden age of mountain exploration in the 1960, 70s and 80s and whose legacy is arguably unrivalled on British shores.
