Meet the editorial team

David Lintern, commissioning editor

Francesca Donovan, production and online editor

Francesca joined The Great Outdoors team in 2022 and stewards both the print magazine and our online presence. Currently based in a Peak District barn, a sedentary upbringing and a fear of the gym led her onto the hills as a tool for fitness. Instead, she found community and adventure as well as a love of the natural world and the magic of mountains. Recently, she spent a summer as an outdoor instructor introducing young people in the Peak to the hills of her home.

So far, her own adventures have taken her from Eryri to the Scottish Highlands by way of the Alps and Málaga mountains. After a decade in journalism at the BBC, ELLE UK and DAZED, she now combines her love of the outdoors with the written word. When she’s not writing or sharing your best mountain portraits on social media, you’ll find her hiking, swimming, scrambling or wild camping.

Hanna Prince, deputy editor

Hanna is deputy editor at The Great Outdoors, with a natural instinct for good journalism and a keen eye for a story. She’s worked as an outdoors writer for more than a decade, contributing regular features to our magazine as well as to most of Britain’s newsstand outdoor and adventure titles. She inherited a life-affirming fixation on walking from her grandma, who’s now nearly 90 and still counts it a bad week if she hasn’t managed at least three 10-mile hikes in the hills.

Once a keen bagger of big European scrambling routes, Hanna has mellowed in her mountain tastes since having kids. She now secretly prefers a good long-distance walk, most recently completing the South Downs Way with her 7-year-old. She’s happiest when camping somewhere high up, waving a flag (either in print or in person) for environmental issues, or doing anything that involves hills, singing or dogs (preferably all three together).

Chris Townsend, equipment editor

Chris is known globally as an expert on hiking skills and equipment. He is the author of 25 books (many of them award-winning) and a record-setting long-distance hiker.

He was the first person to complete a continuous round of all the Scottish Munros and Tops and the first person to complete a continuous walk the length of the Canadian Rockies. He has also travelled the Scottish Watershed and walked coast-to-coast across Scotland 18 times. In the USA he has completed the Pacific Crest Trail, Continental Divide Trail, Pacific Northwest Trail and Arizona Trail plus several self-devised long walks. Other walks include south-to-north through the mountains of Norway and Sweden and 1000 miles through the Yukon Territory. He has also worked as a Nordic ski tour leader in Scandinavia and elsewhere, and as a trek leader in the Himalayas.

Juls Stodel, columnist

Juls scribes our regular Uphill Struggles column, a chance for readers to write in with their trail troubles and peak problems.

She is currently in her fourth year of living voluntarily out of a backpack, wandering though Scotland and Northern England. Her key interest is in the ordinary and everyday human stories in the landscape, clearly expressed through her passion for bothies. A journey of fifteen months saw her spend a night at every Mountain Bothies Association shelter. She is now a trustee for the charity.

When she’s not out exploring with a cheeseboard en board, you’ll find her fixing roofs and installing toilets for the MBA, or answering your queries with wisdom and wit.

Jim Perrin, columnist

Described in The Observer as “the pre-eminent writer on the British landscape”, the writer of our longest running column, Mountain Portrait, is renowned mountaineering and travel writer, Jim Perrin. He is the author of several books, including two winners of the Boardman Tasker prize.

Lucy Wallace, reviewer and skills contributor

Lucy is a Mountain Leader (Summer, Winter and International), and wildlife guide who has worked professionally in the outdoors since 2007. She is based on Arran and works throughout Britain, Europe and Tanzania, on everything from environmental conservation, the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme to Mountain Leader training and assessments. She has tested and reviewed outdoor gear for various titles since 2012 and joined the review team in 2019.

Kirsty Pallas, reviewer and skills contributor

Kirsty Pallas is a safety advisor for national body Mountaineering Scotland, and a freelance mountaineering instructor the rest of the time. She holds the Summer and Winter Mountain Leader and the Mountaineering and Climbing Instructor Awards (working towards the WMCI). She’s been working in the outdoors professionally since 2011 and was hillwalking long before. She’s also a member of Oban Mountain Rescue team.

Alex Roddie, reviewer and skills contributor

Alex has been a hillwalker, mountaineer, and backpacker since 2003, cutting his teeth winter climbing while working as a barman in the famous Clachaig Inn in Glen Coe, before backpacking extensively throughout Britain and Europe. He’s the author of several books and an editor, writer, and photographer across outdoor media. He’s been part of the review team for The Great Outdoors since 2016, and is based in Scotland.

Steph Wetherell, reviewer

Steph is an enthusiastic hiker with a love of long-distance paths, a keen biker and cold water swimmer. She spends part of her time advocating for plus size inclusivity in the outdoors through the organisation she co-founded, Every Body Outdoors, working with the industry to expand the size offering of clothing and kit, running courses and events to support plus size people to get outdoors. She has worked as a freelance writer since 2016.

Peter Macfarlane, reviewer

Peter combines a life in the outdoors with an engineering background to consult on gear design and carry out pre-production testing. His outdoors journey started with the scouts in the 70’s and drew him into the Scottish hills, where you’ll find him in every season, often with a tent. Peter tests gear throughout the highlands, as well during his regular work as a Woodland Trust ranger.

Gemma Palmer, reviewer

Gemma is a passionate outdoor enthusiast who is keen to encourage others to explore nature through her own adventurous journeys and passion for fitness and well-being. She’s a fan of multi-day endurance challenges and enjoys hiking, cycling, running, swimming, and stand-up paddleboarding. As a Paddle UK #ShePaddles Ambassador (2021), she hopes to inspire women in particular to discover the joy of the great outdoors.

Fiona Russell, reviewer

Fiona is better known as Fiona Outdoors, a journalist and award-winning outdoors writer. She lives in the Scottish Highlands and enjoys hillwalking, trail and hill running, back country skiing, sea kayaking, off-road cycling and wild swimming. She was introduced to hillwalking while at the University of Newcastle in the early 1990s. Fiona has compleated the Munros and is now working through her Corbetts.

James Roddie, reviewer and skills contributor

James is a wildlife photographer and guide based in Inverness. He has been hill-walking and climbing in Scotland since 2007 and is nearing the end of his first round of Munros. Highlights of his outdoors career have included first ascents of rock-climbs in Glencoe, backpacking in the Yosemite backcountry, and perfect winter days on the Cuillin Ridge.

Lara Dunn, reviewer

Lara has worked in outdoors media since the late 90’s as a writer, reviewer, and an editor in her own right across adventure travel and cycling titles. She has hiked, cycled, climbed, scrambled, trekked, ambled, and swum all over the UK and further afield.