Shining Tor

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Highest point in Cheshire, England

title: "Shining Tor" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["marilyns-of-england", "mountains-and-hills-of-the-peak-district", "hills-of-cheshire", "mountains-and-hills-of-derbyshire", "highest-points-of-english-counties"] description: "Highest point in Cheshire, England" topic_path: "geography/united-kingdom" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shining_Tor" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Highest point in Cheshire, England ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox mountain"]

Field	Value
name	Shining Tor
photo	Shining_Tor.jpg
photo_caption	The trig point and former ladder stile at the summit of Shining Tor.
elevation_m	559
elevation_ref
prominence	236 m
prominence_ref
parent_peak	Kinder Scout
listing	Marilyn, County Top, Dewey
location	Cheshire, England
range	Peak District
map	United Kingdom Peak District#United Kingdom Cheshire
map_caption	Location in Peak District##Location in Cheshire
map_size	200
label_position	Left
coordinates
grid_ref_UK	SJ994737
topo	OS Landranger 118
::

Shining Tor is the highest hill in Cheshire, England. The summit has an elevation of 559 m above sea level. It is in the Peak District, between the towns of Macclesfield in Cheshire and Buxton in Derbyshire, and is on the administrative boundary between Derbyshire and Cheshire East. The hill is at the south end of a north-south moorland ridge, which also includes Cats Tor, 519 metre high. There is also another hill named Shining Tor, above Dovedale in Derbyshire, at grid reference .

Ascent

The hill offers many walking routes to the top, perhaps most commonly from the Upper Goyt Valley by Errwood reservoir, perhaps combined with a walk along the ridge north from Shining Tor over Cats Tor. It can also be gained with less climbing from the Cat and Fiddle Inn.

Views

As it is the highest point around (it is some 8 m higher than the summit of Axe Edge Moor above Buxton), the views are pleasant, though the relatively flat uplands mean they are not extensive in all directions: the view to the southwest of the peak of Shutlingsloe above Wildboarclough is particularly notable, and in clear conditions Winter Hill near Bolton, the city of Manchester and much of the Cheshire Plain can be seen, including the radio telescopes at Jodrell Bank 20 km to the west. In very clear but not unusual conditions North Wales and even Snowdonia can be seen. The hill is used by amateur radio operators for Summits On The Air activations (G/SP-004, 2 points).

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/33/Cat_and_Fiddle_road_from_Shining_Tor.jpg" caption="Cat and Fiddle road]] from Shining Tor."] ::

Geology

The north–south ridge of Shining Tor including the summit itself is formed from the Chatsworth Grit, a thick sandstone of Namurian age which occurs widely across the Peak District. The beds dip moderately steeply to the east into a north–south-aligned syncline known as the Goyt Trough. Shining Tor is thought to have stood above the ice sheet during the last ice age and so is free from glacial deposits. The eastern dipslope and shallower parts of its western flanks are covered by peat up to several metres deep.

References

Bathurst, David. (2012). "Walking the county high points of England". Summersdale.
[http://www.hill-bagging.co.uk/mountaindetails.php?qu=S&rf=2812 ''Shining Tor''] at www.hill-bagging.co.uk. Retrieved 11 March 2016.
"Shining Tor". viewfinderpanoramas.org.
[https://summits.sota.org.uk/summit/G/SP-004 Summits on the Air - Shining Tor - G/SP-004]
British Geological Survey map sheet 111 'Buxton' & accompanying memoir

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::