Patterdale

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Patterdale village with Place Fell behind

Patterdale is the name of a small village in the eastern part of the English Lake District, and is also the name given to the long valley in which it sits although called the Ullswater Valley.

The village is the start point for a number of popular hill-walks, most notably the Striding Edge path up to Helvellyn. Other fells that can be reached from the Valley include Place Fell, High Street, Glenridding Dodd, most of the peaks in the Helvellyn range, Fairfield and St Sunday Crag, and Red Screes and Stony Cove Pike at the very end of the valley, standing either side of the Kirkstone Pass which is the road to Ambleside.

Further up the valley to the north is the lake of Ullswater with Gowbarrow Fell and Hallin Fell overlooking it. The only tarn in the valley is Brothers Water, one of the first places in the Lakes to be acquired by the National Trust. The only other village in the valley is Glenridding. Patterdale village has a youth hostel, a church, a primary school and a hotel. In summer it can get quite busy, but not so much as Glenridding. Patterdale is considered to be a walkers' valley, and in fact Alfred Wainwright stated that it was his favourite valley in the Lake District as it is relatively undisturbed by tourism.

[edit] Local government

The civil parish of Patterdale also includes the villages of Glenridding and Hartsop and as well as the southern end of Ullswater it also includes the smaller lake of Brotherswater.

From 1894 to 1934 the parish was part of the West Ward Rural District then was transferred to the newly created Lakes Urban District finally becoming part of Eden District in 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972.

At one time the parish was an outlying part of the parish of Barton. Barton being about 10 miles from Patterdale.