Have grown to dislike the Lake District..

[ConfusedParticle]

Lived there for 6 years, in Ambleside then close to Kirkby Lonsdale. Absolutely breathtaking scenery and perfect for a wilderness lover such as myself, but I have only just realised recently that I don't want to go back...

I left to tie up some family estate issues and planned to move back over after covid calmed down (ahem, will it ever!), and since I prefer to rent, this is easy enough to do. There are some exquisite properties and those that I lived in were gorgeous, so it made sense to plan going back.

I have located a new place in the South Lakes and have been offered a moving date for September but I am not so sure at all now and want to have a good long think.

However! Something has been niggling at me for the past year, for such a wild and lovely place, it feels so overly commercialised that I haven't missed the insanity one bit. At first I thought I needed to get my head checked, but recently whenever I consider going back I feel stressed and weary about it. It is very different to live there than to visit as a tourist. The roads, etc are fucking crazy!

But AIBU to not want to live there anymore? It seems so odd to have 'gone off' it like this, and I have really enjoyed the pace of life being less frantic and tourist thronged since ive been in another area, I have no idea how visitors can find it 'relaxing'.

Anyone else feel similarly? For all it's beauty, the hordes (which are increasing by a few million per year) and pollution are depressing. The central areas all contain the exact same shops and any authentic remnants have been gutted.

Gingerbread shop open as usual and hellishly busy as usual. Penrith area is nice.

@StrangeToSee the gingerbread shop is open and busier than ever if that's even possible!

Milnthorpe isn't really in the Lake district, but it is near the seaside

Agree it’s not in the Lake District but the seaside? Do you mean the beach with the quicksand and bore tides (I can’t remember it’s name, my brain’s gone blank, where the nearest train station is)?

You don't have to go back if you don't want to.
Maybe it's time for something new.
I live somewhere touristy in the Alps. It's a bloody nightmare at the moment - the infrastructure isn't sufficient for the hordes of tourists who are coming here. The summer isn't normally as bad as this but because of COVID, people are coming here rather than venturing further afield.
The supermarkets can't keep the shelves stocked, the roads are jammed most of the time, you can't get near a cafe or restaurant, the mountains are thronged with people.
However, come the middle of September we'll have quiet again until the ski season starts mid December (if it in fact does this year...). Traffic even worse - can't go anywhere on a Saturday because there are km long jams in all directions.
I'm thinking about moving somewhere else where it is less touristy or where tourism is handled in a more sustainable manner than fill as many hotel beds as you possibly can without giving a flying fuck about environmental implications or the quality of life of the people who actually have to live here.

@JockTamsonsBairns

YANBU. My Aunt lived in Luss, near Loch Lomond for all of her 84 years of life, and she felt exactly the same as you for the final ten years. Coach loads of tourists arriving day after day, hundreds of people walking up the main street in their droves, peering into the cottages. Her life was never her own in her later years, and it became the source of so much unhappiness for her. I understand the commercial attraction of these places, but the residents pay a high price.

Your poor wee granny, I grew up in Helensburgh so we went to Luss regularly over 40 years ago - before the big car and coach park etc. It was just a wee village, with one supremely tacky tourist shop and you parked in the narrow streets to head down to the quiet beach. Now there is that massive car park disgorging coach loads of tourists and the quaint streets are thronging and treated like a tourist attraction. Definitely a village destroyed by tourism, but that is not recent - I last visited over 15 years ago and was pretty shocked then.

OP, I lived in the Peak District around 20 years ago and it was lovely, but even then the tourist hot spots like Bakewell were hellish on a warm weekend. But if you walked even as little as a mile away from your car/roads, suddenly everyone had gone! I wonder what it is like now.

As a PP said, I now live in Perthshire and it is just grand, lovely, but so overshadowed by the other beauties of Scotland we get peace.

the gingerbread shop is open and busier than ever if that's even possible!

Interesting. I just remember the night mountain rescue teams were scrambled to retrieve his body, poor man. I assumed the shop had closed but apparently not.

I'm in the western Lake District and when we moved here around 15 years ago it was idyllic. But in the last five years the influx of visitors have become unbearable and this has accelerated since the pandemic. If I want to visit anywhere for a walk, I have to get there at 8am just to get parked. Litter and fires are becoming a major issue. Traffic is horrendous and my commute is getting longer and longer. House prices are unaffordable and my husband is really struggling to recruit to his well established engineering firm because recruits can't find anywhere to live as properties are snapped up to be converted into holiday homes.

Cumbria Tourism and the Lake District National Park Authority have prioritised tourists with no thought on how it impacts locals.

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that tourism is essential for Cumbria's economy. But we simply don't have the infrastructure to cope with the 16 million visitors we get each year.

I'd love to move, but my husband's company is here and the kids are settled in school. We recently visited Northumberland for a holiday and it reminded me of what Cumbria used to be like.

Similar issue though different because I live in Australia. We moved from a tiny village in Oz about 4 months ago and into a lovely house in a beautiful seaside town.

It's doing my head right in!

I feel like it's impermanent somehow. The 'holiday' feeling is odd...there's too many Air B& Bs and I can't quite settle.

Hope it wears off!

We live about an hour from the Lakes and have always visited regularly for as long as I can remember, as a family when I was a child and now with my own family. In fact we're heading up there soon for a few days in a family caravan that's permanently sited up there.
Ideally I wouldn't visit in height of summer due to the crowds, we don't want to add to the chaos but this year it's been hard to get away any other time.
We've picked some quieter places to hike, have hired kayaks early evening, and will grab food to take back to our base.
We can't wait, there's nowhere like the beautiful Lake District, it's majestic and magnificent, but I wouldn't want to live there either. Same with Cornwall, where our family live and we visit regularly; this summer especially is utterly insane with visitors.

Interesting. I just remember the night mountain rescue teams were scrambled to retrieve his body, poor man. I assumed the shop had closed but apparently not.

It's possible it shut for a few weeks but that was over ten years ago now.

Last time I went to Grasmere the queue was almost half a mile down the road and that wasn't even in peak season!

I live about an hour away and order mine online - much less stressful

We went to, Snowdonia and marvelled at how uncrowded it was compared to the Lake District. Ditto West Ireland.Try somewhere new with very similar scenery?

I understand your frustration op. I lived in Skipton for a couple of years, which isn’t anywhere near as busy as the Lakes, but very busy on market days. The town is lovely but it was so frustrating just trying to get jobs done on a Saturday morning like going to the bank (I worked full time) and not being able to get down the road as there were so many people at the market. I adore Edinburgh and would love to live there but family who do say it’s utterly horrendous during the festival. Luckily I now live in a very undesirable mill town with no tourists!

I live in the Lakes. I'm not native; I came here for work. I basically don't go to Ambleside or anywhere like that. Windermere I will go to on the train and, when it's the dead of winter, it can be quite quiet. The traffic this year is possibly the worst I've seen and we've had a load of problems with litter/waste over the whole pandemic really. It will calm down when "abroad" is allowed freely again, I'm sure. I also reckon that the reduction in train services due to staff isolations hasn't helped, as lots of people do use it to get up here but are now bringing their cars instead. There's lots of places which just don't get the volume of visitors that Bowness et al do. KB and Sedbergh among them. Maybe people will be forced to visit Barrow or Workington and help boost those local economies

Agree with you 💯

It’s almost like a theme park for people that want the country side. Traffic is impossible, everywhere is over crowded and busy. The majority of cafes restaurants shops and hotels seem to prioritise ripping off tourists over quality and service.

Previous Edinburgh resident. Lived in a conservation area. Got totally fucked off with the tourist coaches parking on our quiet street and disgorging masses of tourists

One woman exclaimed loudly as I was struggling into my flat from miles up the road with a tonne of supermarket shopping (bay outside flat taken up by said coach) "oh, gee, people actually live here".

I now live in central london - close enough in to be handy but far enough out not to be tourist mecca (5 mins walk up the road is though!). it's much better....

We went to Glasgow for a weekend recently - it was lovely, obviously busy but just a nice city vibe, with plenty of places to eat and drink, no long queues, space to breathe. Felt welcomed as a tourist and not taken advantage of. Loved it!

We stopped off in the Lakes for lunch and it was horrible in comparison. Of course the scenery was great but the feeling of everywhere being locked with people, no car parking spaces, nobody letting you out into traffic, nowhere to sit and feeling like you’re being screwed for money everywhere! It put me in a terrible mood.

I think the problem is exacerbated by school holidays being only 5 and a half weeks, and fines for taking children away during term time.
With so many children having missed so much of school during the various lockdowns, self-isolation, etc then no parent will want them to miss more than necessary.
When I have been to the LD, I usually go in school term time, (My DC are now grown up) in May of June, or early September, which does at least space out the visitors somewhat.
As others have said, try some of the lesser known places, and walking away from the towns and villages. There are plenty of local walks to do.

@StrangeToSee Milnthorpe is near the coast. Arnside, silverdale, Hest bank, Morecambe and Heysham all within a 20 minute drive at the furthest.

Yes Morecambe Bay has quicksand. It is still very much "the seaside".

You've made some wild exaggerations there about Milnthorpe. One bus a week? you must've missed the 555 Lancaster to Kendal that goes through at least hourly and has done for as long as I can remember.

Wild funny coloured rabbits everywhere? You sure it was the youths taking substances?!

Taxis are very much available these days too.

"Getting to the actual lakes is tricky" it really isn't. Yes at peak times you'll come across some traffic the same as anywhere. It's really not "tricky" but there could be a 10 minute delay getting into the centre of Bowness if that's where you're headed.

"I think the problem is exacerbated by school holidays being only 5 and a half weeks"

Ours are 7 weeks. Where are you that you've got shortened school holidays?

It depends entirely on where you go. There are some very beautiful, remote, calm, quiet places in the Lakes largely ignored by all but farmers and a few walkers.

The main tourist traps are hideous, and I have no idea why people flock there.

Yep, although I live near Stratford I often go to Leamington Spa instead on weekends because there's fewer tourists! It's ok on my day off during the week but weekend, not a chance!!!

I live in Cornwall although ironically I’ve escaped upcountry for a bit and am considering making it a permanent move. I’ve just given up trying to do anything or go anywhere in touristy areas unless I do it at 7am on a wet Tuesday. Trying to buy a house at the moment but it’s all gone crazy with upcountry buyers inflating prices. Rural Scotland is looking pretty appealing at the moment.

Yanbu. before my husband died, we took quite a few holidays to look at where we might move to on retirement. We moved to where we lived (I still live there) for employment reasons and it too, is very touristy. We were shocked to find the Lake District was worse! We went three time in total, twice in autumn and once stayed up there for Christmas. On both the Autumn holidays we would find that we couldn't park in the villages unless we got there as the shops opened, even the out of town supermarkets.
Do they still "close the Lakes" when it gets busy?
The Christmas holiday was like a fairy tale.....quiet villages, snowy days and a cosy cottage, but not real life!

@uktrippin

"I think the problem is exacerbated by school holidays being only 5 and a half weeks"

Ours are 7 weeks. Where are you that you've got shortened school holidays?

My thoughts too. It's 2 days shy of 8 weeks for us this year (state secondary) a nightmare when that's considerably more than your own holiday entitlement for the whole year.

I sometimes have to go to Cheddar Gorge because DS's sport use a venue near there. I hate even driving through the village and up the gorge because of the throngs of tourists. I would never dream of living there.

However, you can live half an hour away, still in AONB, and be completely off the tourist map. I would have thought maybe the Lake District is the same?