Traveling to the Lake district

Ambleside is where she is heading for.

This is the second recent enquiry which has suggested train to Manchester, and rental car from there to the Lake District. Which is an odd trend.

If taking the rental car solution the sensible solution is to rent from Kendal or Penrith.

Penrith is just a few minutes over 3 hours by hourly train from London for the 280 miles, then 40 minutes by car. Oxenholme (2 miles from Kendal) is 25 minutes closer from London by train- faster than you can legally drive the distance.
Take a taxi into town, or Enterprise may well pick you up from Oxenholme.
I live 40 minutes beyond Ambleside and have done the Airport in 2 hours, admittedly down the motorway not through the Central Lakes (and not lingering either). But if Ings (south of Windermere) to Ambleside is not utterly congested with tourists driving in (a reality which happens far too often as they refuse to use our excellent public transport then wonder why they are in everlasting traffic jams) the routeplanner says 1:45 from the Airport to Ambleside which is about right.
From Kendal it should be about 25 minutes, from Penrith about 30 minutes if you come the A66 route. If you are a confident driver you could come via Ullswater, over the Kirkstone Pass then down 'The Struggle' to Ambleside- should be a bit under an hour but a splendid way to enter the area.

The big issue with Ings to Ambleside is the junction at Windermere Station and the traffic signals at Ambleside (Waterhead Pier). Neither can cope with the pressure of peak traffic. That is why entering from Penrith is the better approach- taking the direct route off the A66 via Castlerigg to Chestnut Hill, not via central Keswick.

The obvious alternative is to fly into Manchester then up into the Lake District. Manchester has direct flights from New York, Orlando and Las Vegas (the last is a seasonal flight), but from many other US cities as a change at Dublin or another European Hub.

If you're only planning to visit the Lake District, then flying in and out of Manchester saves a lot of time. As mentioned by isn31c, it's convenient to take the train from Manchester to the Lake District, then rent from Kendal or Penrith. Enterprise did pick me up from Oxenholme and drove me to their Kendal rental location.

There are several hotels close to Manchester Piccadilly Rail Station which is about 20 minutes from the airport. I stayed at Motel One.

If you want to spend time in London as well, then you may be able to fly into London and out of Manchester or vice-versa for about the same price as in and out of London. That saves making a long train trip both ways.

All the best,

Raymond

As well as hotels in central Manchester (at all budget levels) there are many choices at the airport itself and direct trains from the Lakes to the airport. A new hotel, the Tribe is already part open and will eventually have over 400 beds, as well as all the other hotels there.

**strInc3. Thank you. If we don’t rent a car to get to the Lake District, what is the best way to get there and is there a web site that shows the local transportation options/routes. We will be goin to London after wards and planning on flying home from London,unless you think it’s worth it to go back to Manchester and get our flight.

Raymond thank you for your suggestions

The best way by public transport to Ambleside would be train from wherever you are starting to Oxenholme where you change (across the same platform) onto a Windermere branch train. About every 3 hours those come up from Manchester Airport, the rest of the time they shuttle up and down the branch.
Step outside Windermere Station, and the bus stops are right there. Then you either get the 599 Open Top service (for Grasmere, not the other way to Bowness) 3x an hour or the 555 to Keswick (not Lancaster) hourly (or every 30 minutes in high season).
Seasonally there are often customer service assistants who will sell you tickets and give you paper timetable books before you even board the bus. At other times inside the door of Booths supermarket there are always printed timetable books. You can also buy tickets on the Stagecoach website/app-
https://www.stagecoachbus.com/

That website also gives you a journey planner (Stagecoach run all but one of the bus routes in the area).

For wider journey planning use the Traveline website- https://www.traveline.info/

This was (still is, for another week) the Central Lakes Timetable Booklet for the summer- https://tiscon-maps-stagecoachbus.s3.amazonaws.com/Timetables/Cumbria/Lakes%20Connection/Summer%2024/CNL%20SUMMER%2024%20Lakes%20by%20Bus%20WEB.pdf

Elsewhere in the County (outside the tourist areas) we are about to see major improvements including brand new services (funded by the Government) and Westmorland Council (who cover the Central Lakes) are continually improving services using the same funding pot.

For Windermere Lake "Steamers" see https://www.windermere-lakecruises.co.uk/

Their services include the launch over to the west side of the lake for many walking opportunities on that side, including the west shore walk all the way down from Wray Castle to Lakeside. The lake boats run 364 days a year.
For anyone here at Christmas then Christmas Day is the only day without transport- buses and boats run on Boxing Day and on New Years Day, and to a pretty good service.

What isn't in the book above (but is on the website) is that there is also a half hourly bus down from Oxenholme Station to Kendal Bus Station, for the 555 into the central Lakes- another possible route in. So you don't have to wait for a train to Windermere at Oxenholme if you don't want to. The timetable is also here- https://www.westmorlandandfurness.gov.uk/buses/service/41%2041A

This is the Central Lakes winter timetable book, including the Christmas period services- https://tiscon-maps-stagecoachbus.s3.amazonaws.com/Timetables/Cumbria/Lakes%20Connection/Winter%2024/Winter%202024%20Lakes%20by%20Bus%20WEB.pdf