The Best Hotels Near Forest Side, by the Record
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A Victorian Gothic mansion on 43 acres of Lakeland woodland, Forest Side draws visitors who come for the countryside and find themselves staying for dinner. The rooms split the difference between the house's antique bones and the clean-lined modernity of the restaurant, and the in-room comforts are quiet but considered. The Michelin Guide awards it one Key. Grasmere is Wordsworth country, so expect beauty and a certain amount of damp.
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Twelve rooms on a hillside above Lake Windermere, small enough to book outright if you need the whole house. The Samling is a boutique country hotel that leans away from the manicured-parkland formula: bramble and rough fell are as close as the manicured rooms and restaurant. Service is excellent but the landscape does most of the talking. The Michelin Guide awarded it 2 Keys.
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Every room comes with a balcony and a proper bathtub, which feels about right when you're staring at the Lake District's wilder peaks from the Langdale Estate. This is a boutique hotel, not the stately manor type: hosts rather than butlers, complimentary access to a spa thermal circuit, and outdoor gear on loan from the bootroom. A restaurant and a pub are a short walk away, so roughing it remains entirely optional.
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A Regency country house at the edge of Ambleside, Rothay Manor has been quietly converted into a boutique hotel without losing the bones that make old houses worth staying in. The restaurant leans into refined British cooking built on classical technique, and when you're done eating, the Lake District is right outside. The hotel organizes mushroom foraging tours and guided walks, which sounds like a polite way of saying the landscape will do most of the work.
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A family-owned country house hotel that is quietly two hotels in one: the original Georgian house with modern lodges near Windermere, and a six-bedroom Lake House on its own hundred-acre estate a mile away. An on-demand shuttle connects them. The rooms range from contemporary Georgian to genuinely sleek, which is not what you expect this far into the Lakes. Fine dining and a casual Asian kitchen share the property. Michelin Guide 2 Keys.
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An Edwardian manor house sitting on fourteen acres above Lake Windermere, Linthwaite House is a hotel that threads the needle between polished and genuinely relaxed, with eclectic interiors that feel more inherited than staged. Thirty-six rooms keeps things human-scaled. Simon Rogan's restaurant Henrock is on site, and the conservatory bar makes a strong case for arriving early. Couples on weekend escapes fill most of the rooms, which suits the setting entirely.
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A Georgian country house on the shores of Ullswater that's been remade into something the Lake District didn't know it needed: a wellness and activity hotel with an indoor pool lit by skylights, stand-up paddleboarding on the lake, and a kitchen that modernizes Cumbrian ingredients in ways that would baffle the old guard. The original silhouette stays put; the rest moves forward. If that sounds like a complaint, this may not be your hotel.
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A Victorian country house a few miles from Hadrian's Wall, converted into a hotel where the rooms split between the main house and the old stables, each done in classic furnishings softened with modern color. The surrounding fells invite walking, and the Cedar Tree Restaurant brings an Indian accent to the dinner table, which is not a detail you expect this close to a Roman ruin. The Michelin Guide awarded it one Key.