Windermere Lake Cruises
England's biggest lake from the deck of a proper boat, with red, yellow and green routes so you can pick a 45-minute hop or a full lake cruise. Combo tickets pair it with the aquarium or the steam railway.
Brockhole on Windermere
Windermere & Bowness, Cumbria
The national park's own visitor centre, which quietly became one of its best family days: treetop nets in the pines, archery, mini golf, rowing boats off the jetty and an adventure playground rolling down to the shore.
Entry is free - you pay per activity and for parking - so a picnic-and-playground visit costs almost nothing while the nets and archery stack up as optional extras. Book the nets ahead on fine days.
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What visitors say
★★★★★ 4.6 across 4,197 Google reviews.
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The World of Beatrix Potter
Peter Rabbit's world recreated in walk-through scenes, ending in the garden with Mr McGregor's vegetables. Squarely for the under-8s; it is small, sweet and unashamed of it.
Orrest Head
The classic first family fell: a short climb from Windermere village to a proper summit with the whole lake and the high fells laid out below. A surfaced accessible path now runs all the way up, though it is still a real 120-metre climb, not a stroll.
Holehird Gardens
Ten acres of fellside garden looking down over Windermere, run by the Lakeland Horticultural Society: terraces, a walled garden, glasshouses and children's trails. No fixed entry price and children go free.
Windermere Jetty Museum
Lakeland Arts keeps Windermere's historic boats floating under cover in a wet dock on the Bowness lakeshore, so children see them in water and not propped on stands.
What’s on near you, every Friday
One email a week: what is on this weekend within a sensible drive, and the places worth booking before they go.