Staveley

The riverside freehouse

The Eagle & Child Inn stands close to the River Kent in Staveley, where the village meets the water.

The Eagle & Child has been a pub since at least 1742. It's one of the few remaining traditional freehouses in the Lake District, CAMRA-listed, with hand-pulled local ales including Hawkshead Brewery's and a beer garden that gets lively when the weather allows. The kitchen changes its menu regularly and cooks with meat from village suppliers, plus local fish and game. Thursday is burger night with a quiz. Friday is fresh fish. Sundays are roasts. Vegetarians and vegans are catered for, which not every Lakeland freehouse can say.

Where the Kent meets the mill

Staveley sits in the lower Kent Valley between Kendal and Windermere, on the flat ground before the fells close in. The River Kent runs through the middle of it.

At the heart of the village is Mill Yard, a former Victorian bobbin mill on the river. The mill once made bobbins for the Lancashire cotton industry and was a significant local employer in the nineteenth century. It now houses a bike shop, an outdoor gear shop, a café, a gallery, and a scattering of artist studios. The industrial bones are still visible under the craft businesses.

Beer made here, paths leading north

The Mill Yard also housed Hawkshead Brewery from 2006, after it started in Hawkshead village in 2002. Production later moved to Flookburgh; the Staveley bar closed in September 2024. Its beer brands continue to be brewed in Cumbria.

From the village the Kentmere Valley opens north, narrow and unspoiled, with no through road. A ten-mile circular walk climbs the high ground east of the valley to Kentmere village and returns beside the River Kent. Staveley is also on the Cumbria Cycle Way, and the valley is popular with cyclists for the obvious reason that it's a dead end and stays quiet.

A second freehouse and the way in

At Ings, about 1.8 miles from Staveley in a straight line, the Watermill Inn serves its own ales brewed on site alongside guest beers. Dogs are welcome. Between it and the Eagle & Child, the drinking here is well covered.

Getting here is easy by Lakeland standards. Staveley has its own station on the Windermere branch line, a ten-minute walk from the centre, and buses run from Kendal and Windermere. By car it's the A591, then the B5284.

The market charter

Staveley has held a market charter since 1329. The market is long gone, but the village remains a working place beside the river.