Chester, the Lake District and The Peaks

Hi Ellebf -

Chester is a city, albeit a small one with a ton of history, but there’s nothing in the Lakes or the Derbyshire Peak District that would qualify as a city. My advice as far as the Lakes goes is, if you want to avoid built up areas (though small towns at best), then don’t look to stay in the Bowness/Windermere and Ambleside areas in the south and Keswick in the north. Any other places will be villages or very small towns at most. The same applies in the Peak District - outside of Sheffield (not really in the Peak District, but fairly close by) there are small towns and villages. If you could refine your choices a bit maybe we can give you more specific information?

Ian

Are you wanting a central place to visit all three from?

I read this as somewhere in Manchester which is not city centre for visits to the 3 destinations

But if you were using public transport you would want the opposite- a city centre location.

If driving then if you stay out of the city centre of Manchester then you have the congested Manchester M60 orbital motorway to deal with.

It is not entirely true that the Lake District (or Cumbria at least) does not have a city- there is Carlisle - which is much neglected on this forum.
Also two decent sized towns to stay just on the fringe of the Lake District (and worthwhile destinations in their own right) are Cockermouth and Kendal (both with very easy access to the Lake District). And not that far further afield (still in modern day Westmorland and Furness) is Ulverston- and not only for its Stan Laurel (of Laurel and Hardy connections). Ulverston does have decent bus connections to Windermere and to Coniston direct- as well as for driving in.