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Dalemain Private Tour
The historic house at Dalemain, a few miles from Askham on the Ullswater side — the day that keeps you on the right side of the fells.
See dates & bookAskham is on the wrong side of the fells for most Lakes itineraries, and that is precisely why the day around it should be an Ullswater day rather than a central Lakes one. Fight the geography and you spend the afternoon in the car. Work with it and you get one of the best days in the county.
Quick Facts
Allium occupies a medieval pele tower — a fortified house built when this was border country and cattle raiding was an occupational hazard rather than a story. The Lowther family have held it since 1724 and it still reads as a lived-in house rather than a hotel, which is a large part of the charm.
The kitchen holds one Michelin Star, and the produce comes substantially off the estate: the kitchen gardens, the home-reared meat, the surrounding farmland. Given the setting, that is not a marketing line so much as a description of where you are sitting.
This is the honest bit. Askham is around an hour from Windermere, and the route matters. Over Kirkstone Pass and down through Patterdale is spectacular and slow, and in bad weather or heavy season traffic it is slower still. The alternative round by the A6 or the motorway is duller and more predictable.
An hour there and an hour back, in the dark, after a tasting menu, is not a relaxing end to a day. Either build the whole day around the eastern side of the county or stay over.
The Eden Valley and Ullswater are the answer. Our Dalemain private tour goes to the historic house at Dalemain, a few miles from Askham on the Ullswater side, and the Hutton-in-the-Forest private tour covers the other great house of this corner. Either puts you in the right half of the county all day.
The 10 Lakes full-day tour includes an Ullswater Steamers cruise from late March to late October, which is the grandest possible way to spend the day before an Askham table — though it returns to Windermere at six, so a private day that finishes on the eastern side is the tidier arrangement.
Askham Hall has rooms, and on this side of the fells that is the pragmatic answer. Penrith is the nearest town of any size for taxis and it is not close. Do not plan on improvising the return.
The historic house at Dalemain, a few miles from Askham on the Ullswater side — the day that keeps you on the right side of the fells.
See dates & bookThe other great house of this corner of Cumbria, north of Penrith, with the Eden Valley all around it.
See dates & bookTen lakes and an Ullswater Steamers cruise. The grandest day out in the county — best paired with an overnight on the Askham side.
See dates & bookWe have a guide to what to do around Askham Hall, and our Ullswater and Northern Lakes accommodation guides cover the wider area. Note that our private tours run door-to-door within seven core towns; Askham is outside them, so collection here is arranged as part of a full-day private booking.
About an hour, either over Kirkstone Pass and down through Patterdale — spectacular but slow — or round via the A6. Allow considerably more in poor weather or high season.
Ones that keep you east of the fells: our Dalemain and Hutton-in-the-Forest private tours are both in this corner of Cumbria. Central Lakes days mean an hour's drive in each direction.
Yes. Given the distance from the central Lakes and the length of a tasting menu, staying over is the pragmatic choice.
A fortified stone house built along the Anglo-Scottish border during the centuries of cross-border raiding. Askham Hall's dates from the fourteenth century.
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