Ambleside Tourist Information

Ambleside is at the top of Lake Windermere, under the surrounding fells, an ideal centre from which to explore the Lake District.

Ambleside once produced charcoal for the iron ore smelting in West Cumbria, bobbins for the textile industry, machine toolsas well as quarrying and mining for slate and stone.

Quarrying of the local sllate and stone still takes place.

Most of the buildings in Ambleside date from the Victorian era when the town grew with the arrival of the railway at Windermere.

Of interest is Bridge House, a tiny stone house on an arch over the river Stock Ghyll. Legend tells that a Scotsman built the two-roomed structure to avoid paying land tax. This building is now the information centre for the National Trust.

The Old Stamp House in the town was the poet William Wordsworth’s place of work in his capacity as Official Distributor of Stamps for Westmoreland.

The parish church of St. Mary the Virgin was built in 1854, with a sandstone steeple which, at 180 feet high,towers above the roof tops of the houses. The church contains memorial windows to Wordsworth and his family. Every year is the Rush Bearing ceremony, which dates back to the Middle Ages, from the old custom of annually renewing the rushes, which were strewn on the church floor. Held on the 1st Saturday in July.

Ambleside is famous for its annual sports and sheep dog trials, which are held on the 1st Monday in August.

The Armitt Ambleside Museum shows the local history, photographs by magic of photographer Herbert Bell and Beatrix Potter’s natural history watercolours.

A good centre for walking, with outdoor clothing shops for those last minute items, and for a trip on Lake Windermere from the ferry terminal at Waterhead Pier.

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