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Esthwaite Water does not appear on most lists of the Lake District's finest lakes. It is small — just over a mile long — and sits in a shallow, wooded valley between Hawkshead and Near Sawrey. There is no dramatic fell rising from its shore. The approach roads are minor. It does not have a steamer service or a lakeside café.
But Esthwaite Water was the lake Beatrix Potter loved most consistently throughout her life. She first saw it from the window of the house her family rented in Near Sawrey, as a child. She painted it repeatedly — more times, by some accounts, than any other single subject. And the landscape around it — the low hills, the farm fields, the hedgerows running down to the water's edge — is the landscape that appears more consistently in the Peter Rabbit illustrations than any other.
Esthwaite Water lies in the valley between Hawkshead and Near Sawrey, at an altitude of about 65 metres. It is shallow (maximum depth approximately 15 metres) and, as a consequence of its shallowness and the agricultural land surrounding it, nutrient-rich. In summer, the water has a warm green quality; in winter it is clear and dark.
The shallowness and warmth of Esthwaite Water make it one of the finest fishing lakes in the Lake District. Brown trout, pike and perch all breed here; the lake is managed as a private fishery. The fishing is available to licensed anglers; there is no public access to most of the shore.
The footpaths around the lake are limited compared to larger lakes, and this is part of why Esthwaite Water is less visited than Windermere or Coniston. The quietness is part of its character.
Potter's earliest sketches of Esthwaite Water date from her first visits to Near Sawrey in the 1890s. She returned to the lake as a subject throughout her career, and in her private letters she describes the view across Esthwaite from the fields above Near Sawrey as one of the most beautiful she knew.
The lake and its immediate landscape appear, sometimes directly and sometimes as background, in several of the Peter Rabbit books. The illustrations for The Tale of Mrs Tiggy-Winkle (1905) are largely set in the hills above Esthwaite, with views of the water visible from the higher ground.
The view that Beatrix Potter knew best was from the fields above and behind Hill Top Farm — a view south-east across the Esthwaite valley, with the lake visible in the middle distance and the low ridgeline of the Furness Fells behind it. This view is accessible on a short walk from Near Sawrey.
In early morning, with the light coming from the east across the water and the mist occasionally visible over the surface of the lake, the view has a quality that Potter's own watercolours capture better than most photographs can. It is a quiet, wide, pastoral scene — not dramatic, not spectacular in the Lake District's usual terms, but deeply beautiful in its own specific way.
The Beatrix Potter Hidden Country morning tour passes along the lane above Esthwaite Water and includes the view from Near Sawrey that Potter painted. Your expert storyteller will explain the significance of the lake in Potter's work and point out the specific views that appear in the illustrations.
Esthwaite Water and the Near Sawrey landscape are part of the Beatrix Potter Hidden Country morning tour.