Loweswater

A Tudor Inn and Its Gold

The dining room at the Kirkstile Inn dates to 1549, which is old even by the standards of Lakeland pubs. The inn itself has stood here since Tudor times, at the foot of the valley between two lakes, and it is more or less the whole of Loweswater's public life. There is no shop. There is no railway. There is the inn, the church, the water, and the fells.

Six chefs work the kitchen, which is a lot of chefs for somewhere this remote. The menu changes with the season and leans on local produce: Lakeland steak and ale pie with ale jus and homemade chips or mash, slow-cooked lamb shoulder, Cumbrian chicken, fresh fish off the daily specials board, and wild mushroom and quinoa patties for anyone who wants them. Sticky toffee pudding and a chocolate and raspberry brownie see out the meal. Lunch runs noon to two, snacks fill the gap until half four, and dinner is six to nine.

On tap you'll find Loweswater Gold, which was invented in this building. Cumbrian Legendary Ales started at the Kirkstile before the brewery moved off near Hawkshead. The beer kept the name of the place it came from, and it is still what you order here.

Rooms, Garden and the Quiet Church

There are nine en-suite rooms upstairs and a beer garden out front, which on a clear day looks straight up at Mellbreak.

St Bartholomew's is the church, rebuilt in the nineteenth century on older foundations. It sits by itself between Loweswater and Crummock Water, and its main quality is quiet.

Walking the Lake and Fells

The walking starts at the door. The Loweswater circuit is four flat miles around the lake, one of the more forgiving lakeside walks in the western fells, and about as far from a scramble as the Lake District gets. If you want height, Carling Knott rises to 556 metres above the lake on a straightforward ascent, and Grasmoor at 852 metres is reachable on foot from the Kirkstile by way of Crummock Water. Mellbreak, at 515 metres, closes off the other side of the valley.

Loweswater itself is a mile long and does something no one expects a lake to do. It drains inward — west to east, toward Crummock Water and eventually Derwentwater, rather than out toward the sea. It is one of only two lakes in the district that runs the wrong way.

The Road to Somewhere Quiet

This is the western edge of the Lake District, the corner people mean when they say they've found somewhere quiet. Loweswater is the most remote and least visited of the lakes, which is partly geography and partly the road, which comes in from Cockermouth via Lorton on the B5289 and B5292 and then stops. There is no through route. You arrive at Loweswater because you meant to.

There's no station and the bus is the kind you don't plan around, so you'll want a car. Once you've parked it, you may not need it again. The inn is a few minutes' walk, and the lake begins where the inn ends.