The Lake District is about 34 miles (55 km) across (north-to-south or west-to-east). Its features are a result of periods of glaciation, the most recent of which ended some 15 000 years ago. These include the ice-carved wide U-shaped valleys, many of which are now filled with the lakes that give the park its name. The upper regions contain a number of glacial cirques, which are typically filled with tarns. The higher fells are rocky, with lower fells being open moorland, notable for its wide bracken and heather coverage. Below the tree line native oak woodlands sit alongside nineteenth century pine plantations. Much of the land is often boggy, due to the high rainfall.
The north-western area stands between the valleys of Borrowdale and Buttermere, with Honister Pass joining the two dales. This area comprises the Newlands Fells (Dale Head, Robinson, Catbells) and the ridge joining them. To the north stand Grasmoor, Grizedale Pike and the hills around the valley of Coledale, and in the far north-west is Thornthwaite Forest and Lord's Seat. The fells in this area are rounded Skiddaw slate, with no tarns and few rock faces. The western part is the area between Buttermere and Wasdale, with Sty Head forming the apex of a large triangle. Ennerdale bisects the area, which consists of the High Stile ridge north of Ennerdale, the Loweswater Fells in the far north west, the Pillar group in the south west, and Great Gable (2,949 ft) near Sty Head. Other tops include Seatallan, Haystacks and Kirk Fell. This area is craggy and steep, with the impressive pinnacle of Pillar Rock its showpiece. Wastwater, located in this part, is England's deepest lake.
The central part is the lowest in terms of elevation. It takes the form of a long boot-shaped ridge running from Loughrigg Fell above Ambleside - a popular tourist destination - to Keswick, with Derwent Water on the west and Thirlmere on the east. The Langdale Pikes, with High Raise behind them, are another feature popular with walkers. The central ridge running north over High Seat is exceptionally boggy.
The eastern area consists of a long north-to-south ridge - the Helvellyn range, running from Clough Head to Seat Sandal with the 3,118-foot Helvellyn at its highest point. The western slopes of these summits tend to be grassy, with rocky corries and crags on the eastern side. The Fairfield group lies to the south of the range, and forms a similar pattern with towering rock faces and hidden valleys spilling into the Patterdale valley. It culminates in the height of Red Screes overlooking the Kirkstone Pass.
The far-eastern fells lie on the other side of Patterdale and are characterised by steep sides leading up to a huge moorland plateau, again on a north-south axis. High Street is the highest point on the ridge, overlooking the hidden valley of Mardale and Haweswater. In the south of this region are the fells overlooking Kentmere, and to the east is Shap Fell, a huge area that is more akin to the Pennines than the Lakes, consisting of high flat moorland. The mid-western fells form a triangular shape, with the corners at the Irish Sea, Borrowdale and Langdale. They comprise the Wastwater Screes overlooking Wasdale, the Glaramara ridge overlooking Borrowdale, the three tops of Crinkle Crags, Bowfell and Esk Pike overlooking Langdale and Scafell Pike in the centre, at 3,209 feet the highest ground in England. Scafell one mile to the south-west is slightly lower but has an 700-foot rock face on its north face, Scafell Crag. The valley of Eskdale penetrates this upland wilderness. These fells are the most rugged and craggy of all, and consequently going is slower amongst the tumbled granite.
The south-western fells have as their northern boundary the Hardknott and Wrynose Passes. These are particularly narrow and steep, with tight hairpin bends. The Furness Fells stand between Coniston and the Duddon Valley, which runs NE-SW through the centre of the area. On the other side of the Duddon is Harter Fell and the long ridge leading over Whitfell to Black Combe and the sea. The south of this region consists of lower forests and knolls, with Kirkby Moor on the southern boundary. The South-western Lake District ends near the Furness peninsulas, which leads to Cumbria's second largest settlement (Barrow-in-Furness). The south-eastern area is the territory between Coniston Water and Windermere and east of Windermere. There are no high summits in this group; it is mainly low hills, knolls and bumpy terrain such as Gummer's How, Whitbarrow and Top o' Selside. The wide expanse of Grizedale Forest stands between the two lakes. Kendal and Morecambe Bay mark the edge.
25 highest fells
- Scafell Pike, 978 m / 3210 ft
- Scafell, 965 m / 3162 ft
- Helvellyn, 951 m / 3118 ft
- Skiddaw, 931 m / 3054 ft
- Great End, 910 m / 2986 ft
- Bowfell, 902 m / 2960 ft
- Great Gable, 899 m / 2949 ft
- Pillar, 892 m / 2926 ft
- Nethermost Pike, 891 m / 2923 ft
- Catstycam, 889 m / 2917 ft
- Esk Pike, 885 m / 2903 ft
- Raise (Lake District), 883 m / 2896 ft
- Fairfield, 873 m / 2863 ft
- Blencathra, 868 m / 2847 ft
- Skiddaw Little Man, 865 m / 2837 ft
- White Side, 863 m / 2831 ft
- Crinkle Crags, 859 m / 2818 ft
- Dollywaggon Pike, 858 m / 2815 ft
- Great Dodd, 857 m / 2807 ft
- Grasmoor, 852 m / 2795 ft
- Stybarrow Dodd, 843 m / 2772 ft
- St Sunday Crag, 841 m / 2759 ft
- Scoat Fell, 841 m / 2759 ft
- Crag Hill, 839 m / 2753 ft
- High Street, 828 m / 2717 ft
Lakes
Only one lake in the National Park has the word 'Lake' in its name, namely Bassenthwaite Lake. All the others such as Windermere, Coniston Water, Ullswater and Buttermere use other forms, with 'mere' being particularly common. The major lakes and reservoirs in the National Park are given below.
- Bassenthwaite Lake
- Buttermere
- Coniston Water
- Crummock Water
- Derwent Water
- Devoke Water
- Ennerdale Water
- Grasmere
- Haweswater Reservoir
- Hayeswater
- Loweswater
- Rydal Water
- Thirlmere
- Ullswater
- Wast Water
- Windermere
Geology
The Lake District's geology is complex but well studied. Its oldest rocks are the Skiddaw Slate series and the Borrowdale Volcanic series dating back to the Ordovician, some 500 million years ago. The Skiddaw Slates are found in the north of the park and were probably deposited in shallow seas; their thickness is unknown. The Borrowdale Volcanic rocks are more extensive and form the Lakes' highest peaks, being resistant to weathering. Later intrusions have formed individual outcrops of igneous rock in both these series. The other large rock group is the Silurian Windermere Group, made of Limestone that rests upon the volcanic rocks. Many smaller series are also present.
Wildlife
The area is home to a plethora of wildlife, some of which is unique in England. It provides a home for the red squirrel and colonies of sundew, one of the few carnivorous plants native to Britain. England's only nesting pair of Golden Eagles can be found in the Lake District.
The lakes of the Lake District support three rare and endangered species of fish: the vendace, which can be found only in Bassenthwaite Lake and Derwent Water, the schelly, which lives in Brothers Water, Haweswater, Red Tarn and Ullswater, and the arctic charr, which can be found in Buttermere, Coniston Water, Crummock Water, Ennerdale Water, Haweswater, Loweswater, Thirlmere, Wast water, and Windermere.
Literature and Art
The Lake District is intimately associated with English literature in the 18th and 19th centuries. Thomas Gray was the first to bring the region to attention, when he wrote a journal of his Grand Tour in 1769, but it was William Wordsworth whose poems were most famous and influential. Wordsworth's poem "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud", inspired by the sight of daffodils on the shores of Ullswater, remains one of the most famous in the English language. Out of his long life of eighty years, sixty were spent amid its lakes and mountains, first as a schoolboy at Hawkshead, and afterwards living in Grasmere (1799-1813) and Rydal Mount (1813-50). Wordsworth, Coleridge and Southey became known as the Lake Poets.
The poet and his wife lie buried in the churchyard of Grasmere and very near to them are the remains of Hartley Coleridge (son of the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge), who himself lived for many years in Keswick, Ambleside and Grasmere. Robert Southey, the Poet Laureate and friend of Wordsworth, was a resident of Keswick for forty years (1803-43), and was buried in Crosthwaite churchyard. Samuel Taylor Coleridge lived for some time in Keswick, and also with the Wordsworths at Grasmere. From 1807 to 1815 John Wilson lived at Windermere. De Quincey spent the greater part of the years 1809 to 1828 at Grasmere, in the first cottage which Wordsworth had inhabited. Ambleside, or its environs, was also the place of residence both of Thomas Arnold, who spent there the vacations of the last ten years of his life and of Harriet Martineau, who built herself a house there in 1845. At Keswick, Mrs Lynn Linton (wife of William James Linton) was born, in 1822. Brantwood, a house beside Coniston Water, was the home of John Ruskin during the last years of his life. His assistant W. G. Collingwood the author, artist and antiquarian lived nearby, and wrote Thorstein of the Mere, set in the Norse period.
In addition to these residents or natives of the Lake District, a variety of other poets and writers made visits to the Lake District or were bound by ties of friendship with those already mentioned above. These include Percy Bysshe Shelley, Sir Walter Scott, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Arthur Hugh Clough, Henry Crabb Robinson, Thomas Carlyle, John Keats, Lord Tennyson, Matthew Arnold, Felicia Hemans, and Gerald Massey.
During the early 20th century, the children's author Beatrix Potter was in residence at Hill Top Farm, setting many of her famous Peter Rabbit books in the Lake District. Arthur Ransome lived in several areas of the Lake District, and set a number of his Swallows and Amazons books, published between 1930 and 1947, in a fictionalised Lake District setting. So did Geoffrey Trease with his five Black Banner school stories (1949-56), starting with No Boats on Bannermere.
The novelist Sir Hugh Walpole lived at Brackenburn on the lower slopes of Catbells overlooking Derwent Water from 1924 until his death in 1941. Whilst living at Brackenburn he wrote The Herries Chronicle detailing the history of a fictional Cumbrian Family over two centuries. The noted author and poet Norman Nicholson came from the south-west Lakes, living and writing about Millom in the twentieth century - he was known as the last of the Lake Poets and came close to becoming the Poet Laureate.
Some students of Arthurian lore identify the Lake District with the Grail kingdom of Listeneise.
