The Punch Bowl Inn has nine bedrooms, and every one of them is named after a former vicar of the church next door. The church is St Mary's, and it is close enough that the naming reads less like a theme and more like a filing system. The two buildings have stood side by side for a long time, and at some point the pub simply started borrowing the parish records.
The Punch Bowl is the reason most people come to Crosthwaite. It's a 17th-century inn that has become a serious kitchen — Michelin Pub of Great Britain, and Cumbria Dining Pub of the Year five separate times. You can eat in the formal restaurant, at the informal bar, or out on the terrace, which looks the length of the Lyth Valley.
The menu is British and French and changes with the season. Twice-baked Lancashire cheese soufflé. Creedy Carver duck breast. Cumbrian lamb served with a miniature shepherd's pie. Pan-roasted cod in a cider and mussel sauce. For pudding there's a lemon tart with damson sorbet, and the damsons are local, which matters more here than it would elsewhere. Much of what arrives on the plate comes from the pub's own farm, and the wine list runs to nearly a hundred bottles.
In 1829 the man running the place, Thomas Richard, was recorded as a "victualler and blacksmith." The kitchen has moved on somewhat.
Crosthwaite sits in the Lyth Valley, five miles west of Kendal, and the valley floor is given over almost entirely to damsons. This is the heart of Damson Country. The orchards have been here since at least the 18th century, and in mid-April the whole valley goes white with blossom. Damson Day marks it — a market that pulls in growers, producers and craftspeople from across the area. It is the busiest the village gets all year.
The valley is sheltered and mild, which is why the fruit comes early. The walking down on the flat takes you through the orchards and meadows with no real effort involved. If you want height, Whitbarrow Scar rises nearby — a limestone escarpment and national nature reserve, good for orchids and the odd rare flower. Scout Scar is the other option, another limestone edge, with views out to the Lakeland fells and, on a clear day, Morecambe Bay.
Beyond the pub and its farm shop there isn't much in the way of retail, and the village is unbothered by this. The Damson Day market covers the annual shopping urge.
St Mary's is the older of the two neighbours. A church has stood on the spot since the 12th century — the first mention comes in a grant of land from that period — and it has served the valley's farmers for roughly 900 years without a great deal of fuss.
There's no railway; you come by car, from Kendal on the B5284 or from Bowness along the Lyth Valley road. The buses from Kendal exist, technically. Nearest trains are Oxenholme or Windermere.
The damson sorbet, then, is the one thing on the menu that could only have come from here.
