I had a great day out yesterday – some friends and I climbed to the top of Snowdon in glorious sunshine. Too many people on the mountain at the same time cause bottlenecks near the summit where there is less room for people to ascend. When we bull-doze into mountain sides with modern construction and freeway projects, we may or may not be doing damage to the natural energy currents passing through the mountains.

Right here is an example of a mountain range in California formed by movement of the earth’s crust. Avalanches are caused either by loose snow which accumulates as it rolls down the mountain, eventually forming a large mass, or by a slab of snow which suddenly breaks free.

Volcanic mountains form when molten rock from deep inside the Earth erupts through the crust and piles up on itself. An all-mountain bike is almost the same as a cross-country bike in terms of function. Finally weather is also a great danger, especially on the upper reaches of a mountain.

However, some definitions say a mountain is a hill larger than 300 metres (about 1,000 feet). If you feel strongly about these things, perhaps you ought to consider a hybrid bike, whih has many of advantages of a mountain bike, but is more adapted to the urban environment.

For those of us who would never in our wildest imaginings ride a bike off a sky-high mountain peak and then parachute to earth, I can heartily recommend the documentary Mountain, where such feats are standard. Water as mountains are the world’s ‘water towers’, providing between 60 and 80 percent of all freshwater resources for our planet.