The Lake District: A 7-Day Tour Through Wordsworth’s England & Beatrix Potter’s Hills
The Lake District is England’s largest national park, England’s only landscape on the UNESCO World Heritage list as a “cultural landscape,” and the part of the country that most plainly does not look like the rest of England. Sixteen lakes, 200 fells, slate-stone villages with gardens hanging into the water, and the literary footprint of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Beatrix Potter, and Arthur Ransome layered over almost every view. For American visitors, the Lake District is the rare British destination that compares directly to landscapes back home. The fells around Wasdale and Buttermere have the same vertical drama as parts of New England or the Olympic Peninsula, but compressed into a region y
- Stay two nights each in Windermere, Grasmere, and Keswick — three different valleys, three different feels
- Visit Dove Cottage (Wordsworth’s home) and Hill Top Farm (Beatrix Potter’s home) — both still containing original possessions
- A boat across Windermere, England’s longest lake, and a steam train along the western shore
- The Borrowdale Valley — the most photographed valley in the Lake District, missed by most short tours
- Honister Slate Mine — England’s last working slate mine, with underground tours
- A guided fell walk on Catbells, the Lake District’s most accessible classic summit
Your Day-by-Day Itinerary
Day 1 — Arrive in Manchester, Transfer to Windermere
You’ll be met at Manchester airport on landing and driven 90 minutes north to Windermere — the Lake District’s largest village and the gateway lake. The drive takes you across the Lancashire plain and into the Cumbrian hills, with the first proper view of the fells coming about an hour in. Check into your hotel on the eastern shore of Windermere.
Most American visitors arrive jet-lagged on Day 1, so we keep this evening light: a short walk along the lake, dinner at the hotel, and an early night. If you arrive early enough and have the energy, an afternoon visit to the World of Beatrix Potter Attraction (in Bowness) is a gentle introduction. It’s family-friendly and gives kids the storyline before the more serious Hill Top visit on Day 3. Overnight: Windermere (Holbeck Ghyll, The Samling, or similar)
Day 2 — Windermere & Bowness: A Day on the Water
A full day on and around England’s longest lake. Morning: A boat down Windermere from Bowness Pier. The Lake Steamers run hourly between Bowness, Ambleside (north), and Lakeside (south). The Bowness-to-Ambleside leg takes 30 minutes and gives you the classic shoreline view of the lake — the valley dropping away to the Langdale Pikes at the head. Late morning: Disembark at Lakeside (south) and ride the Lakeside and Haverthwaite Steam Railway — a 3.5-mile preserved Victorian railway that runs through the woods alongside the southern end of the lake.
The trip takes 35 minutes, and the locomotive is the same one that pulled trains here in 1863. Lunch at the historic Mason’s Arms in Strawberry Bank — a 16th-century inn with a beer garden looking south across the Lyth Valley. The pub serves Cumberland sausage, locally-shot game, and Hawkshead Brewery beers brewed five miles away. Afternoon: Drive to the Brockhole Visitor Centre on the western shore — the Lake District’s main interpretation center, with gardens, lake walks, and the best introductory map of the National Park. Then back to Bowness for a walk along the village front and an early evening drink at one of the lakeside terraces. Overnight: Windermere
Day 3 — Hawkshead, Hill Top & Coniston
A literary day, anchored by Beatrix Potter. Morning: Drive 25 minutes west across Windermere by the small Sawrey ferry to Hawkshead — the village where William Wordsworth attended grammar school (his desk is still preserved) and where Beatrix Potter wrote and illustrated several of her Peter Rabbit books. The Beatrix Potter Gallery on the high street holds her original watercolors, in rotating displays. Late morning at Hill Top Farm — Beatrix Potter’s farmhouse, kept exactly as she left it, including her writing desk, her dolls’ house (which appears in The Tale of Two Bad Mice), and her vegetable garden (which appears in The Tale of Peter Rabbit). Numbers are strictly limited; we book timed-entry tickets in advance. Lunch at the Tower Bank Arms in Sawrey — the pub that appears in The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck.
Beatrix Potter drew it from life. Afternoon at Coniston — a slate-stone village at the head of Coniston Water, the lake where Donald Campbell broke the world water-speed record (and was killed attempting to break it again in 1967). The Ruskin Museum tells both stories. A short boat trip on the steam yacht Gondola (a restored 1859 Victorian launch) makes a beautiful end to the afternoon. Drive 25 minutes north to your next overnight, in or near Grasmere. Overnight: Grasmere (The Wordsworth Hotel & Spa, Lancrigg Country House, or similar)
Day 4 — Wordsworth’s Grasmere & Rydal
A literary morning and an afternoon in the central fells. Morning at Dove Cottage in Grasmere — the small whitewashed cottage where William and Dorothy Wordsworth lived from 1799 to 1808 and where William wrote some of his greatest poems, including I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud (the daffodils in question grew on the lake shore at Ullswater, 30 minutes north). The cottage is preserved with original furniture and Wordsworth’s possessions. The adjoining Wordsworth Museum holds the largest collection of original Wordsworth manuscripts in the world. Late morning at Rydal Mount — Wordsworth’s later, larger home, where he lived from 1813 until his death in 1850.
The gardens were designed by Wordsworth himself and remain largely as he laid them out. Lunch at the Daffodil Hotel on Grasmere lake shore. Afternoon walk: A gentle 4-mile loop walk around Grasmere lake and Rydal Water (the “Wordsworth Way”). The path is well-marked, mostly flat, and takes you past the spots Wordsworth described in his Guide to the Lakes — the closest thing the Romantics produced to a guidebook. Allow 2–2.5 hours including stops. Sarah Nelson’s Gingerbread in Grasmere village before you return to the hotel. Made to a recipe Sarah Nelson invented in 1854, sold from a 17th-century cottage, and unchanged in 170 years. Overnight: Grasmere
Day 5 — The Northern Lakes: Keswick, Derwentwater & Catbells
Drive 45 minutes north over Dunmail Raise into the northern lakes — a different country to the southern lakes, with bigger fells, smaller lakes, and a wilder feel. Morning at Keswick — a slate-built market town on Derwentwater, home to the Theatre by the Lake (one of the most beautifully sited theatres in Britain) and the Pencil Museum (the world’s first pencil was made in Keswick in the 1500s, after graphite was discovered in the local fells). Walk the lakeshore and have coffee at the Lakeside Café. Late morning: a boat across Derwentwater — the Keswick Launch makes a 50-minute round-the-lake circuit, calling at seven jetties. We get off at Hawse End jetty for the start of the Catbells walk. Catbells walk (afternoon): The classic Lake District beginner’s fell. 1,481 feet of summit, 2.5 miles round trip, around 2 hours with photo stops.
The walk is steep in places but the path is clear and the summit views — across Derwentwater to Skiddaw on one side, the Newlands Valley on the other — are some of the best in England for the modest effort. We provide a guided walk with a local mountain leader for the day. If a fell walk isn’t right for your group, an alternative afternoon: Castlerigg Stone Circle (a 4,500-year-old stone circle with the entire Helvellyn massif as a backdrop) and a visit to Mirehouse, a 17th-century manor house and gardens with literary connections to Tennyson and Wordsworth. Late afternoon: drive the short distance to your Keswick hotel. Overnight: Keswick or Borrowdale (Lodore Falls Hotel, The Borrowdale Hotel, or similar)
Day 6 — Borrowdale, Honister & Buttermere
The wildest day of the trip. Morning down the Borrowdale Valley — voted multiple times as the most beautiful valley in England. The road south from Keswick follows the valley along Derwentwater, past Lodore Falls (immortalized by Robert Southey in the poem The Cataract of Lodore), through the village of Grange and the Jaws of Borrowdale (a narrow gorge cut by the river), to the village of Rosthwaite and the head of the valley at Seathwaite — England’s wettest inhabited place (it gets 130 inches of rain a year). Late morning at Honister Slate Mine — England’s last working slate mine, on the high pass between Borrowdale and Buttermere. The underground tour takes you a quarter-mile into the mountain to see the slate seams the Romans first quarried.
The Via Ferrata Xtreme (a fixed-rope climbing route up the cliff face above the mine) is a thrilling optional add-on for the adventurous; we can book in advance. Lunch at the Honister Café with views down to Buttermere. Afternoon at Buttermere — a small lake in a deep valley between the Buttermere Fells and Haystacks (where Alfred Wainwright, the great Lake District guidebook author, asked for his ashes to be scattered). A 4.5-mile flat walk circuits the entire lake; allow 2 hours. Dinner that evening either at your hotel or at the historic Bridge Inn at Buttermere village. Overnight: Keswick or Borrowdale
Day 7 — Departure
Transfer to Manchester airport (90 minutes) for your return flight.
If you have a late flight, we can route via Carlisle and Hadrian’s Wall, or stop at Levens Hall (one of England’s oldest topiary gardens) on the way south.
The Route
Why travel with us
Trips you might also love
14 days
From Shakespeare’s Stratford to the Hogwarts Express in the Scottish Highlands — ride iconic steam trains through Snowdonia, the North Day 8 — Departureshire Moors and Loch Lomond on the ultimate rail lover’s adventure.
7 days
The Tower of London, Windsor Castle, Westminster and Covent Garden — then two days in Oxford’s world-famous university city. A perfectly paced introduction to England’s most iconic sights, with transfers included.
8 days
Oxford’s dreaming spires, Blenheim Palace afternoon tea, Cotswold villages, Warwick Castle and Shakespeare’s Stratford-upon-Avon — a gentle self-drive through England’s quintessential heartland.
Ready to plan this trip?
Every Great British Trips itinerary is tailor-made to your interests, dates and pace. Tell us what you want from North Wales — we’ll build the route around you.
Get a Free Quote →