A first trip to the Lakes, based in Keswick

One fell everyone climbs, one flat lake, one pass in between.

One base: Keswick. You unpack once.

A first trip to the Lakes, based in Keswick — Photo: Diliff, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Catbells_Northern_Ascent,_Lake_District_-_June_2009.jpg), CC BY-SA 3.0 licence, fetched 2026-08-31

Nights: 4
Best in: Spring, Summer

First-time hill walkers
Families
Works without a car

Keswick is the easiest town in the Lake District to build a first trip around. It has the biggest bus network of any base in the region, a lake on its doorstep, and Catbells rising directly across the water, a fell short enough to climb in half a day and famous enough that almost everyone who visits the Lakes eventually stands on top of it. This itinerary uses four nights to cover that fell, a flat lake circuit, and a day trip over the pass into Buttermere, without asking for any fell-walking experience at all.

Who this suits

Families and first-time visitors who want to come home having actually walked in the Lakes, not watched them go by from a car window. Catbells has a couple of short rocky steps near the top, enough that Alfred Wainwright’s line about grandmothers and infants climbing it together slightly undersells the final few metres, but nothing here needs boots that have already seen a mountain. The Buttermere day works the same way: a level path round the lake with no climbing at all, useful either as a rest day after Catbells or as the main event for anyone who would rather not climb.

The honest caveat

None of this is hard walking, and anyone who has already done a season of Lakeland fells will find both days short. It also isn’t fully car-free by default: the Buttermere leg needs either a car or the seasonal Honister Rambler bus, which only runs from late March to early November, so a winter version of this week needs a car for that one day even if the rest of it gets by without one. Treat the free fourth day as flexible rather than a gap to fill for its own sake.

Day by day

Day 1

Arrive, and walk the shore

Keswick sits where the River Greta meets Derwentwater, and the level path through Hope Park to Friar's Crag is the easiest way to get a first look at the fells across the water. It needs no more than good shoes and an hour or two, which makes it the right way to arrive rather than a walk in its own right.

If it is coming down sideways: Moot Hall and the shops around it cover a wet afternoon well enough, and the Keswick Launch's covered cabins keep a round-the-lake trip going in all but the worst weather.
Day 2

Catbells, the fell across the water

The launch to Hawse End cuts out the walk round through Portinscale and lands you at the foot of the ridge directly. From there the path climbs over what regular walkers call the two steps, short rocky sections rather than a scramble, to a narrow summit with Derwentwater laid out below and Skiddaw beyond it.
- Catbells from Hawse End · 5.6 km
If it is coming down sideways: The rock on Catbells' summit steps gets slippery when wet, so save the fell for a drier day and take the Keswick Launch's full round-the-lake circuit instead.
Day 3

Over the pass to Buttermere

Both roads into Buttermere, Newlands from Braithwaite and Honister from Borrowdale, climb over 330 metres with sections steep enough to need care, so this is a slower drive than the map distance suggests. Once there, the walk around Buttermere itself is flat and easy for its full four and a half miles, through a short rock tunnel and back, with Fleetwith Pike and Haystacks filling the skyline the whole way.
- Buttermere Lake Circuit · 7 km
Day 4

A free day, or an easy repeat

Nothing is booked for the last day on purpose. A second, slower lap of Catbells early or late, when the crowds have thinned, often suits people better than finding something new to fill the time, and the Keswick Launch runs a full round-the-lake service for anyone who would rather stay on the water.