Mount Everest was climbed before the Old Man of Hoy! This 450ft sea stack off the Orkney island of Hoy was scaled in 1966 by Chris Bonnington, Tom Patey and Rusty Baillie. It took three days to get to the top, and the wooden wedges they hammered in are still firmly in place. Edmund Hillary and Tezing Norgay reached the summit of Everest in 1953.