Explore Cumbria and the Lakes
- Kendal and around
- Cartmel
- Windermere town
- Bowness and the lake
- Ambleside
- Great Langdale
- Grasmere and around
- Coniston and around
- Hawkshead and around
- Keswick and around
- Honister Pass
- Buttermere
- Eskdale
- Ravenglass and around
- Whitehaven and around
- Cockermouth
- Ullswater
- Penrith and around
- Carlisle and around
Coniston Water is not one of the most immediately imposing of the lakes, yet it has a quiet beauty that sets it apart from the more popular destinations. The nineteenth-century art critic and social reformer John Ruskin made the lake his home, and today his isolated house, Brantwood, on the northeastern shore, provides the most obvious target for a day-trip. Arthur Ransome was also a frequent visitor, his local memories and experiences providing much of the detail in his famous Swallows and Amazons children’s books.
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Brantwood
Brantwood
Sited on a hillside above the eastern shore of Coniston Water, Brantwood was home to John Ruskin from 1872 until his death in 1900. Ruskin was the champion of J.M.W. Turner and the Pre-Raphaelites and foremost Victorian proponent of the supremacy of Gothic architecture. His study and dining room boast superlative lake views, bettered only by those from the Turret Room where he used to sit in later life in his bathchair. The surviving Turners from Ruskin’s own art collection are on show, and other exhibition rooms and galleries display Ruskin-related arts and crafts, while the excellent Jumping Jenny Tearooms – named after Ruskin’s boat – has an outdoor terrace with lake views. Meanwhile, paths wind through the lakeside meadows and into the various gardens, some based on Ruskin’s own plans – his slate seat is sited in the Professor’s Garden.
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Coniston’s speed king
Coniston’s speed king
On January 4, 1967, Donald Campbell set out to better his own world water-speed record (276mph, set three years earlier in Australia) on the glass-like surface of Coniston Water. Just as his jet-powered Bluebird hit an estimated 320mph, however, a patch of turbulence sent it into a somersault. Campbell was killed immediately and his body and boat lay undisturbed at the bottom of the lake until both were retrieved in 2001. Campbell’s grave is in the small village cemetery behind the Crown Hotel, while the reconstructed Bluebird is displayed in a purpose-built gallery at the local museum, where you can find out more about Campbell and that fateful day.
