60 Fun Facts About Lake District

The Lake District lies in which English county?

The Lake District lies within Cumbria, in North West England; at 2,362 square kilometres it is England's largest national park.

What is the highest mountain in England, found in the Lake District?

Scafell Pike is England's highest peak; its summit is a boulder field of Borrowdale Volcanic Group rock, laid down by pyroclastic eruptions about 450 million years ago.

How high is England's highest mountain?

Scafell Pike's summit stands 978 metres (3,209 feet) above sea level, edging out neighbouring Sca Fell at 964 metres.

Which is the longest and largest lake in England?

Windermere runs about 11 miles from Waterhead to Newby Bridge, holds 18 islands, and has drawn tourists since the railway reached it in 1847.

Which is the deepest lake in England, at 79 metres?

Its famous screes tumble into the water below Illgill Head, and its head is ringed by Great Gable, Lingmell and England's highest peak.

In what year was the Lake District National Park established?

The Lake District National Park was designated on 9 May 1951, in the first wave of UK national parks, and was extended eastward by about 3% in 2016.

The Lake District became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in which year?

UNESCO inscribed the Lake District as a cultural landscape in July 2017, citing its farming traditions and the Picturesque and Romantic movements it inspired.

Which is the only Lakeland lake officially named a 'Lake' rather than mere or water?

Bassenthwaite Lake, north of Keswick, is the only one officially named 'Lake'; the rest are waters (Ullswater), meres (Windermere) or tarns.

How many major lakes does the Lake District contain?

The Lake District is conventionally said to have 16 major lakes, most filling U-shaped glacial valleys; Buttermere and Crummock Water were once one lake, split by silt.

What weather record does Seathwaite in Borrowdale hold?

Seathwaite is the wettest inhabited place in England, averaging about 3,300 mm of rain a year; nearby Sprinkling Tarn tops 5,000 mm.

On average, snow falls on Helvellyn on how many days a year?

Snow falls on Helvellyn on about 67 days a year on average, and the high fells see around 100 days of gales, far more than the sheltered valleys.

Which industry grew up in Keswick thanks to locally mined graphite?

Borrowdale graphite, known to miners as wad or plumbago, gave rise to pencil making in Keswick, where the first pencil factory opened in 1832.

In Neolithic times the Langdale Pikes were the site of a 'factory' producing what?

Neolithic workers roughed out stone axes from Langdale tuff; the axes have been found all over Britain, and some of the country's earliest stone circles are linked to the trade.

The Castlerigg stone circle near Keswick has been dated to roughly when?

Castlerigg was raised around 3200 BC in the late Neolithic, making it one of Britain's earliest stone circles; counts of its stones range from 38 to 42.

Which poet's 1810 Guide to the Lakes was especially influential in popularising the region?

William Wordsworth first published his Guide to the Lakes in 1810; by 1835 it had reached a fifth edition under the much longer title 'A Guide through the District of the Lakes'.

Wordsworth's 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud' was inspired by daffodils on the shore of which lake?

He saw them in April 1802 on the way home from visiting his friend Thomas Clarkson.

Wordsworth, Coleridge and Southey are known collectively as what?

The Lake Poets took their name from the region; Southey lived at Greta Hall in Keswick for forty years, and Wordsworth succeeded him as Poet Laureate in 1843.

Dove Cottage in Grasmere, home to William and Dorothy Wordsworth from 1799 to 1808, was originally what?

Dove Cottage had been a public house, the Dove and Olive Bough, until 1793; Thomas De Quincey took over the tenancy in 1809.

To which larger Grasmere house did the Wordsworths move from Dove Cottage in 1808?

The growing family left Dove Cottage for Allan Bank, above Grasmere, in May 1808, then moved to the Rectory and finally to Rydal Mount in 1813.

Where is Wordsworth buried?

Wordsworth was buried in Grasmere churchyard, at St Oswald's, in April 1850, beside Hartley Coleridge, the poet's son, who had died the year before.

Beatrix Potter bought which farm at Near Sawrey in 1905 with the proceeds of her books?

Beatrix Potter bought Hill Top, a 17th-century farmhouse at Near Sawrey, in 1905 with royalties from her books; she later married solicitor William Heelis and moved to nearby Castle Cottage.

On her death in 1943, Beatrix Potter left over 4,000 acres and a dozen farms to which organisation?

Beatrix Potter left her farms and some 4,000 acres to the National Trust, whose co-founder Hardwicke Rawnsley, vicar of Wray, had been a formative influence on her.

Which hardy Lakeland sheep breed did Beatrix Potter champion?

Herdwicks are the native fell breed; about 95% of the roughly 50,000 ewes graze within 14 miles of Coniston, which left them badly exposed in the 2001 foot-and-mouth outbreak.

Which dale in the south-west of the district was Wordsworth's favourite?

Dunnerdale, also called the Duddon Valley, inspired Wordsworth's River Duddon sonnet sequence of 1820; it lies well away from the busy central lakes.

The Lakeland sheep-counting rhyme 'Yan tan tethera' survives from which linguistic roots?

Yan, tan, tethera descends from Cumbric, the Brittonic Celtic language spoken in the region before English; its numbers match Welsh un, dau, tri.

The Lakeland words 'fell', 'tarn' and 'howe' come from which language?

Viking settlers brought fjallr for mountain and tjern for a small lake; 'thwaite' and 'beck' are from the same source.

Alfred Wainwright's seven-volume Pictorial Guide covers how many Lakeland fells?

Wainwright's seven volumes describe 214 fells, every page drawn and hand-lettered by him between 1952 and 1966 at roughly a page an evening.

Wainwright devised which 182-mile footpath crossing the Lake District from west to east?

Wainwright published the Coast to Coast Walk in 1973; it runs 182 miles from St Bees on the Irish Sea to Robin Hood's Bay on the North Sea.

What was Wainwright's day job in Kendal from 1948 to 1967?

Wainwright became Kendal's Borough Treasurer in 1948, having moved from Blackburn in 1941 for a lower-paid post in the treasurer's office to be near the fells.

Where were Wainwright's ashes scattered by his widow Betty?

Betty Wainwright scattered his ashes at Innominate Tarn on Haystacks in 1991; he had called Haystacks his favourite fell and asked to be left there.

Which small lake lies enclosed between Helvellyn's Striding Edge and Swirral Edge?

Red Tarn, about 25 metres deep, sits in Helvellyn's eastern corrie between the two edges and was dammed in the 19th century to supply water to Greenside Mine.

What unusual feat was achieved on the summit of Helvellyn in 1926?

A small aeroplane landed there on 22 December 1926, when Bert Hinkler and John Leeming put an Avro Gosport down on Helvellyn's summit plateau, stayed a few minutes, and took off again.

What was Donald Campbell's teddy-bear mascot, found floating after his fatal 1967 Coniston Water crash, called?

Mr Whoppit, the teddy bear Campbell carried on every record attempt, was found floating among the wreckage on 4 January 1967; his body was not recovered until 2001.

Which lake was enlarged by a dam in the 1930s, drowning the village of Mardale Green?

Manchester Corporation dammed Haweswater between 1929 and 1935 to supply the city, drowning the villages of Mardale Green and Measand.

Who led the diving team that recovered Bluebird K7 and Campbell's body from the lake bed in 2001?

Tyneside diver Bill Smith's team raised Bluebird K7 from Coniston Water on 8 March 2001 and recovered Campbell's body that May; Smith then spent years restoring the boat.

Kendal Mint Cake owes its existence to a happy accident in 1869, when Joseph Wiper left what overnight?

Wiper left a boiled solution for glacier mints overnight; it turned cloudy and set solid, and his great-nephew Robert Wiper later supplied the result to Shackleton's 1914 Endurance expedition.

The Traditional Cumberland sausage, protected by the EU in 2011, must be sold in what form?

Traditional Cumberland sausage, granted EU protected status in 2011, is sold as a long coil; the pork is coarsely chopped and seasoned mainly with black and white pepper.

In which year was Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons first published?

Swallows and Amazons appeared in 1930; the Walker children were named after the Altounyan family, whom Ransome taught to sail on Coniston Water in 1928.

Which Victorian critic spent his final years at Brantwood, a house beside Coniston Water?

John Ruskin bought Brantwood in 1871 and lived there until his death in 1900; his assistant W. G. Collingwood wrote the Norse-era novel Thorstein of the Mere nearby.

Hugh Walpole's home Brackenburn sits on the slopes of which fell above Derwent Water?

Brackenburn stands on the lower slopes of Catbells at Manesty; Walpole lived there from 1924 until his death in 1941 and wrote the Herries Chronicle there.

In Pride and Prejudice, which character is 'excessively disappointed' at not getting to tour the Lakes?

Elizabeth Bennet had hoped to see the Lakes with her aunt and uncle Gardiner; their shortened tour goes to Derbyshire instead, where she meets Darcy at Pemberley.

Which Ice Age relict fish is native to Derwent Water and Bassenthwaite Lake?

Vendace, a whitefish stranded by the last Ice Age, is native in England only to Derwent Water and Bassenthwaite Lake; stocks were moved to Sprinkling Tarn as insurance against warming.

A pair of which raptors nested in the Lake District in 2001, the first for over 150 years?

Ospreys nested at Bassenthwaite Lake in 2001, the first Lakeland breeding pair in over 150 years; England's last golden eagle, a lone male at Haweswater, was last seen in 2015.

Which pony breed native to Cumbria did Queen Elizabeth II ride in her later years?

The Fell pony, a hardy black or dark-brown breed from the Cumbrian fells, was the Queen's late-life riding mount; her Fell pony Emma stood at Windsor during her 2022 funeral procession.

Which two linked passes are famous for gradients that challenge cyclists?

Wrynose and Hardknott passes run west from Little Langdale via Cockley Beck; Hardknott's hairpins reach a 1-in-3 (33%) gradient.

What speed limit for powered craft was enforced on England's largest lake from March 2005?

Windermere's 10 mph limit took effect on 29 March 2005, effectively ending water-skiing and powerboat racing on the lake where Norman Buckley set records in the 1950s.

What is the name of the largest, privately owned island in England's largest lake?

Belle Isle, about 40 acres and opposite Bowness, carries a round Georgian house of 1774; the Curwen family bought the island in 1781.

Which playwright began his first hit comedy, named after a Lakeland lake, in summer 1891?

Oscar Wilde wrote Lady Windermere's Fan in 1891; it opened at the St James's Theatre, London, in February 1892 and was his first stage success.

Which Borrowdale waterfall did Robert Southey describe in an 1820 poem of tumbling rhymes?

Southey's 'The Cataract of Lodore' (1820) piles up rhymes ('and thumping and plumping and bumping and jumping') to mimic Lodore Falls on Watendlath Beck, near the southern end of Derwent Water.

Which travel writer's 1698 ride over Kirkstone Pass is among the earliest recorded tourist visits to the Lakes?

Celia Fiennes crossed Kirkstone Pass on horseback in 1698 during her side-saddle tour of England; Daniel Defoe followed in 1724 and called Westmorland 'the wildest, most barren and frightful' county.

Thomas West's 1778 Guide to the Lakes listed 'stations'; what were they?

West's 'stations' were recommended viewpoints for admiring the scenery; buildings went up at some, and the ruins of Claife Station survive on Windermere's western shore.

Which upland area became the UK's first national park, a month before the Lakes in 1951?

The Peak District became the UK's first national park on 17 April 1951; the Lake District followed on 9 May 1951 and kept its original boundaries until 2016.

Which 868-metre Northern Fell is also known as Saddleback?

Blencathra, 868 metres, earned the name Saddleback from its profile seen from the east; Wainwright gave it the longest chapter in his Northern Fells volume.

The Lake District is the UK's second-largest national park after which one?

The Cairngorms, at about 4,500 square kilometres, is the UK's largest national park; the Lake District, 2,362 square kilometres, is the largest of the thirteen in England and Wales.

The narrow-gauge steam railway from Ravenglass climbs into which valley?

The Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway, nicknamed 'La'al Ratty', runs seven miles up Eskdale to Dalegarth station near Boot.

Roughly what share of the national park's land is owned by the National Trust?

The National Trust owns about 25% of the park, roughly 600 square kilometres; most of the rest is private farmland.

Which water company owns about 8% of the land in the Lake District National Park?

United Utilities, the North West's water company, owns about 8% of the park, including the Thirlmere and Haweswater catchments; the park authority itself owns just 3.9%.

Honister Pass links Borrowdale with which valley?

Honister Pass climbs from Seatoller in Borrowdale to 356 metres and drops to Gatesgarth at the head of Buttermere; its green slate has been quarried since the 18th century.

The 2016 eastward extension of the national park reached the valley of which river?

The 2016 extension, about 3%, pushed the park's eastern boundary out to the Lune valley and the M6 corridor, narrowing the gap with the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

Which town at the head of Windermere has the tiny 17th-century Bridge House over Stock Beck?

Ambleside's Bridge House, a 17th-century apple store straddling Stock Beck, is one of the National Trust's smallest properties and once housed a family of eight.