Grasmere

Grasmere is at the heart of romantic Lakeland. It was here that the Lake Poets (Wordsworth, Coleridge, De Quincey, Southey) gathered in their youthful fascination with the lakes and mountains. Today Dove Cottage (which is not in the village itself but a little south, near to the lake's eastern shore on the road to Ambleside) is the shrine toward which the feet (and wheels!) of their devotees move relentlessly throughout the year.

Grasmere, Wordsworth's Cottage, 1936
Reproduced courtesy of The Francis Frith Collection.

Although the Wordsworth family lived in three different houses in the area before eventually moving to Rydal Mount it is Dove Cottage (then known as Town End) which has captured the imagination of people down the years and it is there that the museum, book shop and research centre are located. In the village churchyard the graves of the Wordsworth family are visited by people from around the world.

The Lake

A Glimpse of Grasmere
by A. Heaton Cooper

The lake itself, however, and its village to the north of the water were here long before the poets. It was Grasmere that made the poets, and not the poets who made Grasmere. Two hundred years later it still thrills its visitors, whether lightly clad in the summer sunshine or wrapped warmly in fleece and anorak for a walk around the lake in the January frost.

Grasmere is a small lake, only a mile long and less than half a mile across at its widest. It has one island. The road on the eastern shore is the main Ambleside to Keswick road. The one on the western side climbs high above the lake, and eventually leads to Langdale. Rowing boats can be hired, and the fishing is excellent. Permits can be bought in the village. The lake holds large shoals of roach, and good sized bream are often caught. However, Grasmere is especially noted for its pike, and 20lb specimens are not uncommon.

The Village

In the village itself there are several shops catering for a variety of tastes. For those who have forgotten some item of their mountain walking gear there is an outdoor clothing store, and for those with an interest in Lake District visual art there is the Heaton Cooper Studio at which the work of several generations of the Heaton Cooper family can be admired, and purchased. My personal preference is for the warm tints of paintings by Alfred Heaton Cooper (1864-1929), many of which can be seen as illustrations on pages of this site.