Carn Ingli from Newport

Newport is the only town in Pembrokeshire with a mountain directly behind it, and Carn Ingli is close enough that you can walk from the pub to the summit in an hour and a bit.

Head up through the town from the church, past the castle — privately owned, not open — and onto the lanes that climb to the edge of Newport Common. Once you're on the common the surfacing stops and you're on open grazing land: gorse, bracken, sheep, and semi-wild ponies that have been up here longer than anyone can remember.

The climb is steady and there are several ways up. Aim for the ridge and then work along it to the rocky crown. The final approach is a scramble over blocks of dolerite rather than a path, and it's the only part where you need to pay attention.

The summit is covered by one of the more impressive Iron Age hillforts in Wales. There are stretches of rampart wall, the outlines of dozens of hut circles and a series of enclosures built into and around the natural rock. It's not a tidied-up site with an information board every twenty metres — you're picking it out yourself, which is more satisfying.

The name means something like the Hill of Angels, and it's linked to St Brynach, the 6th-century saint who founded the church down in Newport and who was said to have communed with angels up here. The parish church still carries his name.

The view is comprehensive: Newport Bay and the estuary below, the beach at Traeth Mawr, Dinas Head and Fishguard to the west, the whole Preseli ridge running away south-east, and Cardigan Bay opening to the north.

Come down westward along the ridge and pick up the track that leads towards Bedd Morris, a standing stone by the mountain road, then drop back into Newport by the lanes on the western side of the common. That makes a circuit of about five miles. Coming straight back down the way you went up is quicker and perfectly fine.

Where to finish. Newport punches well above its weight for food — pubs, a couple of serious restaurants, a good bakery and a deli, all within a few minutes of the bottom of the hill.

Combining it. The Dinas Island circular is ten minutes away by car and makes a good second half-day.