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| Name: | The Verne |
| Hill number: | 5431 |
| Height: | 152.3m / 500ft |
| Parent (Ma): | 2896 Lewesdon Hill |
| RHB Section: | 41: South Central England |
| County/UA: | Dorset |
| Catchment: | Minor Rivers only (South) |
| Class: | Hump, Tump (100-199m), Submarilyn, Clem (Hu,Tu,1,sMa,Cm) |
| Grid ref: | SY 69148 73862 |
| Summit feature: | W lip of grass surrounding concrete slab |
| Drop: | 143.6m |
| Col: | 8.7m SY 5820 8290  |
| OS map sheet(s): | (1:50k) 194 (1:25k) OL15W |
| Comments: | Summit in Portland Prison but accessible, col on Chesil Beach |
| Change log: | show changes for this hill entry |
| GPS data: | show GPS entries for this hill |
N.B. Some hill summits are on private property or on land where there is no public right of way. Permission should be sought from the landowner where access to a hill summit is through private land.
Please report via the contact page any logs you see below which describe or encourage acts of trespass. Please quote the hill number and hill name.
| Logged Descriptions (logged by 131 users, only the latest 50 shown - Show all) | By | Date of Ascent |
| Mark Jackson | 11/04/2024 | |
| After exploring Portland Castle with Lesley, we left the car in the car park and headed up the Coastal path to the road and then followed it to the tunnel and wound our way up and around to the cafe. I headed over to the summit via vegetation from the South. Descended via a path of sorts and rejoined Lesley to have a drink and cake in the cafe. Great views from the back garden of the cafe. We headed over to Tout sculpture park afterwards to explore some of the nooks and crannies there before winding our way down back to the start. Quite an adventure. | Dazingdale | 29/03/2024 |
| AlanD | 06/03/2024 | |
| frm cp by roundabout at end of causeway, up through houses then prison road to top. Nice flat white in Jailhouse Cafe. | IanHHill | 14/02/2024 |
| We drove up for breakfast at the Jailhouse Cafe. A great spot. Then a short wander up to the high point. Drove down to Portland Bill before returning to Weymouth. | KevPalmer | 15/01/2024 |
| Tom Mundell | 28/12/2023 | |
| Trekking toes | 28/12/2023 | |
| twg27 | 19/12/2023 | |
| interloper | 09/08/2023 | |
| Fletch | 09/08/2023 | |
| DC11main | 09/07/2023 | |
| Arrived at 4:50 on a drizzly Tuesday afternoon. Parked up and walked around a bit. Sadly cafe had closed at 4pm. Left just after 5pm as lots of workers were clocking off. | Minto | 04/07/2023 |
| abbo0001 | 26/06/2023 | |
| danpquinn | 22/04/2023 | |
| dave g | 17/05/2022 | |
| Andy West | 08/05/2022 | |
| First visit to Weymouth and Portland. Feels rather remarkable place. Arrived at dusk. Gonna sleep the night and see it in the dawn light at sunrise. | vegibagger | 06/08/2021 |
| Birthday day out at HMP Verne!!! Spent the morning at Portland Bill climbing rocks and exploring the bays until rained off from the picnic. Headed to the Jailhouse Cafe and bagged the summit. Great views | ekm | 11/07/2021 |
| Parked by disused stone building next to the radome at SY 6923 7388 - Less than 100m across to the W. lip of the concreted summit mound. Excellent view of Portland Harbour & Chesil Beach. (S) | gerrybowes | 12/05/2021 |
| Drive up, easy access and described by others. A few quick pictures of the fleet and Chesil Beach then with the Cafe closed didn't hang around. | rhalstead | 19/04/2021 |
| With Bev | simon and co | 17/10/2020 |
| bwm | 03/09/2020 | |
| clique | 12/07/2020 | |
| Nearest summit to home. Delighted to find I was initially reading the altimeter incorrectly. I thought we were starting at 120 meters only to discover it was feet I was looking at not meters! so increased elevation by 98 M not 30 odd as I thought! yay | stagger onward | 09/05/2020 |
| Drove up to the cafe car park through the tunnel. Too early for the cafe so just nipped up the grassy mound. | fosal29 | 06/02/2020 |
| Took the opportunity to make a short visit to Portland before lunch in Weymouth at years end. Enjoyed the coastal path and the views across Chesil beach from a very windy Portland. | Buck | 31/12/2019 |
| As others, drove through tunnel up to car park. | PGCE | 01/11/2019 |
| softsquare | 25/10/2019 | |
| No problem after 6 PM when the cafe closes. | Eddie | 11/07/2019 |
| From YHA via Freeman's Incline. Jailhouse Café is open and well worth supporting. On to Portland Bill on the SW Coast Path. | summitsup | 31/05/2019 |
| AngusDog | 06/05/2019 | |
| It seemed unlikely that the high point would be possible to visit but it is no problem. Great views back across to the mainland over the harbour and of Chesil Beach. | clivevilla | 26/03/2019 |
| Bag and go from car park inside the citadel near the Jailhouse café at the Verne. Sadly this café closed in June 2018. However, no problem with access to the summit hump, opposite a house with a cannon that points across Portland Harbour in its garden. | KeithByTheC | 12/09/2018 |
| A quick drive up to the prison, went as far as we could on an extremely wet, cloudy day. | steverd | 29/07/2018 |
| TD, C & H | This Dog | 21/07/2018 |
| Sherlock | 27/06/2018 | |
| AJ&B | 01/06/2018 | |
| Swindon Bagger | 20/05/2018 | |
| Glasgow Girl | 20/05/2018 | |
| As others, parked on Jailhouse Cafe & Visitor Centre car park at SY 69239 73837. | David Gradwell | 14/05/2018 |
| Edwin Gradwell | 14/05/2018 | |
| George Gradwell | 14/05/2018 | |
| Road access to site @ SY 7370 6847 | carole engel | 23/02/2018 |
| After ignoring the satnav ended up on the wrong side of the prison - still outside of course. 1.6m walk back along SW Coast Path/Merchant’s Way. As has been noted before, the Jailhouse Cafe offers refreshment while the summit was easily accessible notwithstanding all the prison type notices/architecture. | Newton Maximus | 07/12/2017 |
| With K. Sinister place. | Ashley | 16/11/2017 |
| Bug | 16/11/2017 | |
| With Val. Parked at the Jailhouse Café. On summit in couple of minutes. Fantastic viewpoint. Good weather. | mike.hoult | 10/11/2017 |
| Kiltie | 08/10/2017 | |
| JohnnyG | 25/09/2017 | |
| From the Jailhouse Cafe car park north along the road and then up the mound to the high point. | Mariana Trench | 17/09/2017 |