Wray Castle

Wray Castle is a Gothic Revival fantasy of turrets and battlements built in the 1840s on the western shore of Windermere for James Dawson, a retired Liverpool surgeon. Sixteen-year-old Beatrix Potter holidayed here in 1882, met the local vicar Hardwicke Rawnsley, later a co-founder of the National Trust, and began her lifelong love of the Lakes. The castle is currently closed for a major restoration, so the interior and its family play rooms are off limits, but the grounds are open daily and reviewers say they justify the trip: lakeside paths, woodland trails, picnic spots and views across the water to the fells. Dogs are welcome on a lead across the whole estate, with treats at the cafe, a water station and a stick store, and an all-terrain tramper can be borrowed. Tips from visitors: the grounds are free and only the car park is charged, arriving by launch from Ambleside in season is a good alternative, and facilities are temporary while the works continue.