Brantwood, Coniston - Home of John Ruskin

This morning I came across a photograph from 1991. Not digital, of course, but easily scanned to put here. It shows Brantwood, the home of John Ruskin near the shore of Coniston Water, on the opposite side of the lake from the village.

I remember well the day I took this photo from the boat coming over from Coniston jetty. I was with a friend from London who, in common with very many highly educated and widely traveled people in the South, still knew little of the North of England. This was part of his induction into the beauties of North Lancashire and the Lake District.

A tour of Brantwood was, as always, a fascinating experience. If I recall correctly it was a Ghandi display that caught my friend's attention. I've been there many times, both before and since that afternoon. This is a special place, and should be on the itinerary of any thinking person who visits the Lake District.

Across the water in Coniston village there is also the Ruskin Museum founded in the early years of the twentieth century by W. G. Collingwood, who in earlier life had been Ruskin's assistant. This includes not only Ruskin items but displays relating to the Coniston Copper mines and Donald Campbell's eventually fatal water speed record attempts on the lake.

Coniston has a lot to offer. When visiting the Lake District don't confine yourself to the central areas of Windermere, Grasmere and Keswick.

Other Museums and Galleries in Cumbria

In addition to the outdoor attractions of the mountain environment there is a wide range of things to do and places to visit on the wet days. Click here for museums and galleries in Cumbria.

Ullswater in the English Lake District

Another quick note from Around-England.

Yesterday I added on the main Around-England blog a post about Saturday's trip to Ullswater.

Today I spent some time updating and adding more photos to the site's main Ullswater page.

Just now I came across a nice photo on 'twitpic', uploaded there by Lina Hogg, of Ullswater seen from near Aira Force. (You get to a larger sized photo on the 'twitpic' site by clicking on this one here).



Also this afternoon I found a really nice blog run by Ian and Melanie of Eden Outdoor Adventures, including a great description of a walk in the Ullswater valley.

Copper Mines in the Lake District

More than thirty years ago I read several books on the history and industrial archaeology of the Lake District and was amazed to learn that the wonderful scenery was far from "natural". Industries of many types over many centuries have shaped what we see today.

Recently I have begun to refresh my memory on all that study, and to take it further. The Coniston copper mines interested me especially at first, and then other copper mining areas such as the Newlands Valley and the Caldbeck fells.

Eventually I hope to write something more extensive but in the meantime have started to produce some short pieces about Lake District mining on my Around-England sites. An early one of these is: Copper Mines in the Lake District

I hope these will be interesting and helpful to people interested in the story of how we come to have the Cumbria Lake District as it is. Even in areas like the mountains around Ullswater, close to villages such as Glenridding ad Hartsop, there are miles upon miles of tunnels in the hillsides, in this case mainly from lead mining.

Wainwright Guides to the Lake District Fells

I've just added a new page to "The Lake District in Books" covering the second edition of the famous Wainwright Pictorial Guides to the Lake District Fells. I now have several of them and hope to complete the collection soon. They are a great update to the originals, some of which were published 50 years ago and had become a little outdated as paths had been diverted, etc.. The original style has been retained which is good.

Lake District Cottages

Lake District cottages are widely available to suit a great variety of holiday needs, from solo visitors and couples to large groups of family and friends. At one end of the spectrum you can find the basic clean and tidy accommodation you might want if your priority is simply to have a bed and a place to put your boots before getting out again into the hills. At the other end of the scale there's superluxury.

Holiday cottages in the Lake District are often modernised or developed from buildings two or three hundred years old, many originally built as farmhouses or as labourers' cottages close to a farm. Others may be the former homes of miners and quarrymen who worked in what were for centuries major industries of Lakeland. More recently, however, barn conversions have become popular, so that self-catering accommodation is often located in what were once farm outbuildings. This provides for an interesting variety of properties for holiday rental and there are, of course, more recently built units dating back just a decade or two.

Choosing your Lake District Cottage

You can find cottages in the Lake District to rent in many beautiful locations, and that includes in the busy towns and villages. You can also find them in remote spots, high on hillsides and deep in valleys, far from the crowds. Some people like to rent in the less-visited areas away from the Lake District heart, for example in the beautiful Eden Valley or on the West Cumbria coast. This allows for a quiet holiday, and yet it is easy to drive into the main centres.

That mention of driving reminds me to say that if you're visiting for the first time you should be sure to look carefully at a contour map of the Lake District when choosing a cottage to rent. Remember that the middle of Cumbria consists of mountains. Roads across them are few, can be steep and narrow, and in some cases are certainly not for drivers of a nervous disposition. If you have places in mind that you'd especially like to visit remember that you may have to drive around the outside of the mountain range to get to them. The distance are not vast, but if you are thinking of a holiday with relatively little time behind the wheel choose your Cumbrian cottage location carefully.

Being a Responsible Lake District Holiday Cottage Visitor

In some parts of the Lake District there is now so much holiday accommodation that it has become a problem for the local population, and this leads me to make an appeal. Village shops need customers if they are to survive. Already many village schools have disappeared as local young people cannot afford to live in what have become substantially holiday villages. Post offices have vanished, and village stores often follow. Please patronise the local shop rather than drive twenty miles to a superstore. It may be a bit more expensive but set against what you're paying for your holiday cottage rental it will be a very small percentage. What's more, a walk down the lane doesn't use petrol.

More on Lake District Accommodation

My main site and blog, Around-England.co.uk, carries much more information on

Accommodation in Cumbria – The Lake District

Or click here for: Holiday Cottages in the Lake District

Enjoy your Lake District Holiday

and remember, you can find much about this and other areas of the North of England (which, by the way, has no less than four beautiful National Parks) at Around-England.co.uk.

Lake District hill walkers need good maps

Far too many people venture out onto the hills without adequate equipment, and one piece that is often missing is an adequate map - combined with the ability to read and interpret it.

Today I have written an article for thelakedistrict.inbooks.co.uk on choosing the right kind of map for the purpose. Touring maps are for the car. Ordnance Survey 'Landranger' maps are for low level walking. If you're going out on open fells or high mountains you need a 2.5 inches to the mile OL series map, and you should familiarise yourself with it before your trip.

Suitable Lake District maps are not a luxury for a walking holiday or even am afternoon. The right choice may well be your life-saver.

Ravenglass - Roman baths and mountain railway

Eighteen hundred years ago troops of the First Cohort Aelia Classica of the Roman army in off duty periods could relax in the extensive recreational facilities of Glannoventa. It had underfloor heating, some compensation for the wild cold they'd been braving in the mountain foothills and maybe further afield and higher, up to Mediobogdum at the top of the pass.

This was what we now know as Ravenglass on the West Cumbria Coast. The remains of the recreational bath house, now in the care of English Heritage, are most of what remains of this outpost of the empire. Today people come here for two main purposes. Just over the brow of the hill is Muncaster Castle, a splendid historic house with much to attract visitors both inside and in the grounds, especially during the rhododendron flowering season.

In Ravenglass village itself is a rather special railway station. Actually it's a double station. There is the "big" train that comes up from Preston, Lancaster and Barrow on its way around the coast to Whitehaven, Workington and Carlisle. But that's not the big attraction. There's also "Laal (little) Ratty". The Ravenglass Railway, or to give its proper title The Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway, has now run as a preserved narrow gauge line for over fifty years. Before that it had been an industrial line since the 1870s, carrying not only passengers but the products of iron ore mines and granite quarries down to the main line for transportation on to the manufacturing centres of the Northwest and beyond.

The Ravenglass railway is seven miles long. It follows the river Mite to start with, then rounds the end of Muncaster Fell at Eskdale Green and on into the valley of the Esk, continuing upwards toward the foothills of England's highest peak, Scafell Pike. Many years ago there was a suggestion to extend it up the mountain so that Cumbria would have had an English equivalent of the Snowdon Mountain Railway in Wales. It didn't happen and given the strength of today's environmental campaigning it probably never will.

Although many thousands of visitors come here each year it is still true that the majority of visitors to the Lake District stay in the centre of the region and ignore the West Cumbria Coast area. There is, however, much to attract here including not only beautiful Eskdale but also a little further north the valleys of the two westernmost lakes, Wastwater and Ennerdale Water.