The English Lake District

For centuries, the English Lake District has been renowned as an important cultural, sacred and literary landscape. It is therefore surprising that there has so far been no in-depth critical examination of the Lake District from a tourism and heritage perspective. Bringing together leading writers from a wide range of disciplines, this book explores the tourism history and heritage of the Lake District and its construction as a cultural landscape from the mid eighteenth century to the present day. It critically analyses the relationships between history, heritage, landscape, culture and policy that underlie the activities of the National Park, Cumbria Tourism and the proposals to recognise the Lake District as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It examines all aspects of the Lake District's history and identity, brings the story up to date and looks at current issues in conservation, policy and tourism marketing. In doing so, it not only provides a unique and valuable analysis of this region, but offers insights into the history of cultural and heritage tourism in Britain and beyond.

You can count on Rick Steves to tell you what you really need to know when traveling in England. In this guide, you'll find a mix of splendid cities, ever-so-quaint villages, historic ports, and seaside resorts. Visit the manors, museums, cathedrals, and castles that preserve England's history. Explore the scenic bays of Cornwall, hike the wild moors of Dartmoor, and discover why the Lake District is Londoners' favorite playground. Travel back in time at Stonehenge, tour the remnants of the Roman Empire along Hadrian's Wall, and see the ancient baths in the city of Bath. After a bustling day of sightseeing, relax at a neighborhood pub, sharing a chat and a pint with a friendly local. Rick's candid, humorous advice will guide you to good-value hotels and restaurants. You'll learn how to get around England by train, bus, or car, and discover which sights are worth your time and money. More than just reviews and directions, a Rick Steves guidebook is a tour guide in your pocket.

An alternative view of the North West of England that delves into its stranger past. I Hate the Lake District offers a different vision of the rural environment from those found in much contemporary nature writing. Based on the author's trips around North West England, the book engages with nuclear power and nuclear war, slavery, imperialism, ghosts, love, God, cockroaches, and the sheer violence and contingency of “nature” itself—of which the human presence is merely a part. Each chapter starts with an account of a visit to a place in this remote part of England, the deep north, but digresses and wanders through multifarious themes and subjects. Among the sites Gere visits are the defunct nuclear power station at Sellafield, home of all British nuclear waste; Lake Coniston, where Donald Campbell died trying to break the water speed record; Hadrian's Wall, furthermost reach of the Roman Empire; the mysterious and deathly Morecambe Bay; sites of slavery in the North West; places where UFOs have been sighted, avant-garde artists created work, and Islamic terrorists trained; shantytowns where the navvies who built the railways lived with their families; and even the remains of Blobbyland in Morecambe. In I Hate the Lake District, Gere challenges the bourgeois pastoralism of popular nature writing and reveals the landscape of North West England as profoundly unnatural and strange.