Wordsworth and Wild Ennerdale

Wordsworth and Wild Ennerdale
in Blog Posts, Places of Interest, The English Countryside 624 Words

Entering Ennerdale you will find an untamed solitude and tranquility, the sublime beauty of the crags and the pastoral charm of the valley. No wonder Wordsworth loved the place.

Wordsworth’s Lake District

Ennerdale is in the far North West corner of the Lake District and it has no public roads. This means few tourists but the fell walker. When Wordsworth came here in 1799 it inspired him to write his poem ‘The Brothers’. Alfred Wainwright, the renowned fell walker and writer also loved this remote part of the western fells:

“The fleeting hour of life of those who love the hills is quickly spent, but the hills are eternal. Always there will be the lonely ridge, the dancing beck, the silent forest; always there will be the exhilaration of the summits. These are for the seeking, and those who seek and find while there is still time will be blessed both in mind and body.”

Alfred Wainwright, A Pictorial Guide To The Lakeland Fells: The Western Fells.
Calm at Ennerdale Water
Wild, lonely, distant, quiet, sublime beauty. Long may Ennerdale stay like this!

Remote and Beautifull Ennerdale

Tis one of those who needs must leave the path
Of the world’s business to go wild alone..

From Wordsworth’s poem ‘The Brothers’

Many others have been drawn to leave the busy world and walk in these quiet Lakeland valleys, climb these eternal hills and visit the summits with their glorious views. On these fells the worries and stress of life seem to drop away as you climb, breath the refreshing mountain air and contemplate the great works of the Creator. Once you have been here the memory of the days spent among these fells stays with you for life. It certainly has for me.

Lakeland view from Green Gable
The view down into Ennerdale from Green Gable, Great Gable’s smaller neighbour. Pillar mountain with its famous playground for serious rock climbers stands aloft to the left. (‘On that tall pike it is the loneliest place of all these hills.’) To the right you can see down into Buttermere and Crummock Water.
Mountain peak shrouded in mist

‘You see yon precipice – it almost looks
Like some vast building made of many crags,
And in the midst is one particular rock
That rises like a column from the vale
Whence by our shepherds it is called, the pillar.’

From ‘The Brothers’

Mountain Grandeur

When Wordsworth visited Ennerdale in 1799 he met a local man who told of a tragic accident that once happened on Pillar mountain. It became the basis for the poem The Brothers:

“The poem arose out of the fact, mentioned to me at Ennerdale, that a shepherd had fallen asleep upon the top of the rock called The Pillar, and perished as here described, his staff being left midway on the rock.”

Wordsworth’s Notes on this poem ‘The Brothers‘
Remote Blacksail Pass youth hostel
Blacksail Youth Hostel, at the head of Ennerdale. – This is as remote as it gets when it comes to hostels in England. Formerly a shepherd’s bothy, the nearest public access to it by road is at Wasdale Head, from where it is a two and a half mile walk over a mountain pass. Kirk Fell is seen here on the right with Green Gable and Great Gable on the left.

Wild Ennerdale


In the 1950’s renowned fell-walker, Alfred Wainwright, wrote critically about the way that the sombre conifer plantations planted by the Forestry Commission in the post war years were spoiling the slopes of the Ennerdale hillsides. He would have been delighted to know that, during the past few years, the Wild Ennerdale Project has been cutting down the conifers to allow open deciduous woodland to develop naturally here along with other measures to re-wild this remote corner of Lakeland. Wild Ennerdale is ‘wild’ indeed!

Visit the Wild Ennerdale Project