The walk up to Easedale Tarn is a lovely short stroll from the chocolate box village of Grasmere, famous for its association with the Romantic poet William Wordsworth. We found this walk on a trip to the Lakes about four years ago on a rainy Saturday in November – despite a fairly continuous stream of drizzle it was a beautiful walk with quintessential Lakeland scenery. And of course, finished off by hot chocolate and cake to warm up at the end…
We followed this very easy five mile linear walk on Walk Lakes, which starts from Grasmere, following Sour Milk Gill gradually uphill from the village to reach Easedale Tarn. This walk has a difficulty rating of 1/5 on Walk Lakes and this is fair, although the path is uneven in places and slippy in wet weather (I twisted my ankle after hanging onto the lead when Merry lunged after an interesting smell – I made sure I’d laced my boots up properly before our next walk!)
If you aren’t staying in Grasmere, there are a few car parks available (details on the Lake District National Park website), although given how popular Grasmere is these fill up very quickly. This is one for an early start! There is plenty to do in Grasmere so once you’ve finished your walk why not make a day of it and visit Wordsworth’s grave or the famous Grasmere Gingerbread.
My favourite stop in Grasmere is Heidi’s Grasmere Lodge, which as well as being a self-catering accommodation unit, also has a bustling cafe on the ground floor. I’ve been here quite a few times now and the cake is amazing, the customer service is great and the hot chocolate is proper hot chocolate rather than the watery rubbish you get elsewhere! The cafe is also dog friendly and if you have a photogenic pooch they have a ‘dog of the day’ feature wall – if you call in see if you can spot Merry among the previous dogs of the day!
Dog friendly rating – 3/5. Like nearly all walks in the Lake District there are sheep throughout, so dogs need to be under close control, preferably on a lead. Merry loved this walk as there were so many opportunities for swimming (you follow the gill for a while before arriving at the tarn itself). This walk was pretty busy – we saw quite a lot of people walking along the path, probably as it’s such an easy walk with incredible views. Therefore, if your dog isn’t a big fan of strangers, this might be an area to avoid (Grasmere in particular is never anything short of heaving).
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