The textbook blurb : Lake District,
famous scenic region and national park in the county of Cumbria, England. The
national park covers an area of 2,243 sq km. It contains the principal English
lakes, including Windermere (17 km long), and the highest English mountains
(Scafell Pike, 978 m). The famous lake-strewn valleys of the region radiate
from a core of central mountains, thus making through routes difficult to
establish but also contributing to the distinctive character that makes the
entire Lake District attractive to tourists. The geological structure is
basically a dome, with hard, pre-Carboniferous rocks forming most of the
principal summits, such as Scafell Pike, Scafell (3,162 ft), and Helvellyn
(3,118 ft). To the north softer Ordovician rocks give more rounded hills
(Skiddaw [3,054 ft] and Saddleback [2,847 ft]). In the south, lower hills of
Silurian slates and grits surround the lakes of Windermere, Esthwaite
Water, and Coniston Water. This structure has been influenced by glacial action
that deepened existing valleys, both scooping out the rock basins that now
contain the lakes and also creating (by truncating former tributary
valleys) a number of "hanging valleys" with attractive waterfalls.
The area was long isolated from the south and east by moorlands, peat bogs,
lakes, and forests. Two Roman roads were built across the region, and later
Norse invasions resulted in a period of forest clearance. The Cistercian abbeys
of Furness and Byland, exploiting the area for wool production, continued the
process of deforestation, which was accelerated by iron-ore smelting and,
later, by the extraction of lead and copper. These activities became uneconomic
after the 1870s, and labour was diverted into slate and building stone
quarries. The state Forestry Commission has covered large areas with conifers
but has agreed to leave the central fell (upland) area in its deforested state
with fragmentary deciduous woodland. The Lake District became a national
park in 1951, and the increased social mobility of the population of the
industrial regions of northern England has stimulated the tourist industry.
Traditional forms of extensive agriculture (cattle and sheep rearing) have been
intensified and include the production of milk and eggs. The increased demand
for water by industrial north west England has resulted in the use of Thirlmere
Lake as a reservoir, precluding its use for recreation. The Lake
District was the home of William Wordsworth, who was born at Cockermouth
and is buried beside his sister and his wife in Grasmere churchyard. Since the
early 19th century, the region has had many other well-known literary visitors
and residents.
