When visitors first come to the Lake District, likely as not they’ll come toWindermere. Indeed, for many visitors,Windermere IS the Lake District. However, those who explore no further than the outdoor shops and tea-rooms of Bowness and Ambleside are missing out on some terrific walking country – particularly the range of hills overlooking the lake. Hard-core walkers head for the higher hills, while day-trippers tend to stick to the lakeside towns. This means that the network of tracks and paths aroundWindermere are seldom crowded, even on the busiest of Bank holidays.

The lake itself is the main attraction, of course – whether seen from a height, from the shore or from one of the boats that offers a regular passenger service between Lakeside, Bowness and Ambleside. Walks can be combined with a trip on the car ferry, or a ride on the Lakeside-Haverthwaite railway. However, there are many other attractions too: historical houses such asTownend, Blackwell and Beatrix Potter’s HillTop, a bobbin mill, a house built on a bridge, a Victorian Gothic castle and a home on an island shaped like a pepper pot. Most of the walks feature a pub along the route – for rest and refreshment – and none of them are overly strenuous, suitable for a young family or just a group of friends out to enjoy the priceless Cumbrian countryside. Halsgrove’s exciting new-format guide, packed with maps, photographs and useful information, is all that the modern leisure walker needs.

John Morrison has written, or illustrated, about fifty books,mostly covering the northern counties. Other of his titles from Halsgrove include Moods of Yorkshire, A Portrait of Leeds and Dawdling Through the Dales. Compiling a book about Windermere was no great hardship as he now lives in a shack almost on the Lake shore, in the company of woodpeckers and mergansers.

Imprint: Halsgrove, ISBN 978 1 84114 717 8, hardback, 110x155mm, 64 pages. Published June 2008.

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