Mountaineer and wild swimmer Pete Kelly on his new book Wild Swimming Walks

What can be better after a long slog up a fell on a hot summer’s day than slipping off your boots and stepping into a cool mountain mere or a clear tarn for a refreshing swim?

Mountaineer and wild swimmer Pete Kelly knows this joy more than most and in his book Wild Swimming Walks he shares some of the best locations he has discovered for a swim-hike. The concept combines classic Lakeland fell walking with the chance to swim in wild waters, some well-known but others less visited.

The book has come at a time when wild swimming has never been popular, apparently growing by 400 per cent recently. The lockdowns provided both the time and motivation for Pete to complete the book as the appeal of the outdoors – and wild swimming – began to reach a much wider and bigger audience.

Some of the 28 routes will appeal to determined walkers with a mere as the ultimate goal on high mountain terrain, while others are opportunities for a dip in a river or waterfall as a refreshing interlude on an easy or moderate stroll.

Helvellyn

For the “amphibian-human” notes Pete, there is “the ever-present dilemma”: do you “stop and swim by the glistening pools or head to the soaring heights of the hills?” As both a mountaineer and a freshwater swimmer, it is clearly a choice he grapples with regularly.

Faced with such a decision, his book does present a solution – head out early so you can do both. Making the most of swimming opportunities within a six to eight-mile swim-hike, and putting aside time for refreshments en route, will typically fill the best part of a day; other targets, like Stickle Tarn and the Langdale Pikes, with three hours walking and an hour swim, can be squeezed into half a day.

In order to appeal to a wide range of outdoor types from serious swimmers to family explorers, there are ‘stop for a dip’ walks, mile-swim hikes, the chance to bag peaks – Cat Bells, Scafell Pike, Helvellyn and High Stile en route to water among them – distance swims (Crummock Water has over four kilometres to go at), quarries for the most experienced only and some routes even offer several different experiences on one trek, like Staveley, the River Kent and the tarns of Potter Fell.

Who could resist Gurnal Dubs – the plural dubs referring to the three tarns that later merged into one – for instance? “The dam wall has been tastefully done and together with the boathouse as its western end, creates a kind of ‘lido in the fells’ ambience,” writes Pete.

The appeal continues. Harrop Tarn “is often colder than expected and has a wonderful golden colour if the sunlight is streaming through it as you swim, encouraging the odd dive to the roots of the lilies to gaze up through the shimmering water”.

Borrowdale

Meanwhile, the Blea Tarn at Beckfoot walk “weaves in and around one of the best locations for wild swimming in the Lake District and includes tarn swimming, multiple waterfall pools and some lovely deep river glides”.

There is also the chance to combine a swim with a boat ride – Coniston Launch Company offers not only a different perspective of the lake but also heated cabins, “good for spring and autumn season diehards,” Pete writes. He has spent a lifetime discovering these exhilarating experiences.

He had an affinity with water from an early age. Brought up in the North East, Pete learned to swim in the tidal pools of Northumbria’s beaches, in the slow moving glides of the River Wear and at Birtley baths, encouraged by his dad. “He was a very keen bird watcher and angler and mam went along too. It drove her mad because when we weren’t swimming we were falling in; she always had to take several changes of clothes.

“I was carried up the Cheviots before I could walk. It was part of an active childhood. It was all such an influence and not a day goes by where I don’t thank them for that.”

As a child he visited the Lakes regularly with his family and now lives in Ambleside with his wife Andrea and son William, who’s six.

Easedale and Sour Milk Gill

Together they founded Swim the Lakes in the village in 2005 and went on to pioneer adventure swimming in the Lake District. They continue to run guided swimming trips, courses and adventure swimming holidays and introduce hundreds of people to outdoor swimming every season.

“We were well ahead of the curve,” says Pete. “We do courses now with 15-20 people but in the early days there were just one or two. It definitely wasn’t mainstream, but I knew it was such an interesting way of approaching an outdoor activity. To us, it’s a means of adventure and I knew it could be a business.

“I genuinely believe this is the best destination in the world for outdoor swimming in allowable water. We have hundreds of lakes, tarns and rivers not to mention waterfalls and pools and thankfully the National Park is very supportive.”

It is impossible for him to differentiate which came first in his own life – mountaineering or swimming. “When I’m in the water I’m always looking at the mountains thinking I’d like to be up there, and when I’m on a fell top I’m always scouting below for tarns and places to swim,” he admits.

With so much knowledge of where to swim, it wasn’t difficult for him to come up enough walks for the book. He explains: “Daniel Start, the author of the original Wild Swimming book (he coined the phrase ‘wild swimming’), approached me and asked me to write a book about the Lakes, as we were so influential in the development of outdoor swimming in the region.

“Together we came up with the idea of combining classic fell walking, with classic swimming locations. This is effectively what we do at Swim the Lakes, so I wasn’t short of subject matter.”

Langstrath

In fact, the main problem was narrowing it down to 28. He chose a variety of easy, medium and hard experiences across the Lake District from The Falls of Swindale in the east to Scoat Tarn and Low Tarn in the west, High Dam and the River Leven in the south to the River Caldew and Bowscale Tarn in the north. A few classic walks were rejected because the swimming didn’t meet the mark, and others were adapted.

“I’ve learned from experience as a swim guide that while, for example, Easedale Tarn might be the main event, what people enjoy the most are the secret dips along the way,” he says.

‘Secret’ is a charged word in this context and Pete navigates a difficult line between wanting people to experience all that the Lakes has to offer while protecting the beauty and solitude of places less well known. His “worst nightmare” is people photographing these special sites and posting on social media.

“I’m a commercial operation,” he says, “but there’s no way I would have written the book if these places weren’t already in the public domain; they are classic, established walks.

“Too many people visiting a place can affect its character, and I have a responsibility to protect the special places. What I object to most is people asking, ‘where are all the best places?’. I’m very hesitant to give spots away; some of them have been hard won. Some have been shown to me by locals who would be horrified if I took a group there. But anyone with a sense of adventure and a map could find them, it just takes a bit of effort.”

He alludes to some in the book; others are hidden in plain sight and just require a degree of curiosity to be discovered.

Pete, Andrea and William

Pete is regularly asked the impossible question of which are his favourite swims, but he does name one – Scoat Tarn – which he loves for its inaccessibility. “It takes effort to get there but I know I can go and see nobody else. I first discovered it 35 years ago and camped overnight; it was a silent as the grave. It’s not Instagram friendly,” he laughs.

The book doesn’t only contain instructions and maps for the best swim-hikes, it is also a tribute to local history, legend and literature, with asides on geology, farming and tourism too.

“The Lakes is so interesting, I wanted to imprint my own love of culture and how poetry and art add to any outdoor experience,” says Pete. “For me, poetry means nothing unless you a have a sense of its place. To be by the edge of a tarn or lake that William Wordsworth was inspired by, it gives so much more to the experience. It’s like drinking a very good malt whisky in Scotland, it means more there.

“I’m no expert, but with an understanding of the past comes a certain amount of respect; if you live and love a place then you have respect for what’s gone before.”

Although this is Pete’s first book, he has featured in a number of television programmes about wild swimming including the BBC's Countryfile and Secret Britain and writes a regular column for Outdoor Swimmer Magazine. He adds: “I genuinely enjoy writing, I like the aesthetics of it. I think we’ve got a great language and I love that it’s influenced by the Vikings and we still use Old Norse words so it’s easy to be driven to write about that.”

Of Blea Tarn, whose name is derived from the Old Norse blar meaning dark or dark blue, he describes how it can “look cold” even on a warm, bright day. “Despite that, once in the water and peering into the water with goggles it is full of light and blue-green colour, shafts of sunlight are rendered indistinct and almost physical against the deeper blue of the abyss beneath,” he writes.

Borrowdale

There are local legends too, for example, the two immortal fish named Adam and Eve by Eliza Lynn Linton in Bowscale Tarn that could speak and were popularised by William Wordsworth. Henry Clifford, a Dr Doolittle-esque character, was said to be on speaking terms with the fish.

Stories of other old Lakeland characters abound too such as mountain guide and adventurer Millican Dalton who lived in a cave on Castle Crag for nearly 50 summers, and there is wild swimmers’ lexicon from ‘schwingmoor’ to ‘joffing’ – jumping off a crag or other ground into the water.

For wildlife watchers Pete has plenty of tips on where to see – or at least be in the presence of – rare and unusual creatures.

Easedale Tarn’s “undulating bottom provides fascinating viewing thanks to the water clarity; keep an eye out for marauding shoals of colourful, stripey perch in warmer weather which provides a tropical feel unusual in a northern wild swim”.

Red Tarn contains speckled brown trout and is the highest and smallest lake to be home to the protected schelly, a type of freshwater herring left over from the Ice Age. Schelly are also found in Brotherswater and Small Water.

Buttermere is home to Arctic char, but the precise location is a closely guarded secret. The ancient woodlands of Langstrath is the place for pied flycatchers and roe deer with red deer above the treeline and, soaring overhead, buzzards and peregrine falcons.

Geology often plays a significant part in creating some of Lakeland’s prime swim spots where the power of glaciation now offers memorable experiences.

Blea Tarn, with a depth of 63 metres, is one of the deepest bodies of water in the Lake District – only Windermere and Wastwater are deeper. “To dive down as deep as you dare in its clear oligotrophic waters is an experience not to be forgotten; its depths seem endless, and as a situation for mountain swimming it is awe inspiring,” write Pete.

Stickle Tarn

Emerald Pool is appealing simply for its name, but when you learn there is a chance of finding semi-precious garnets in the rock it moves high up the list of locations.

For the particularly adventurous who are inclined towards a spot of skinny dipping there are suggestions for stripping off, including at Codale Tarn and Blackmoss Pot.

Pete has even nearly been in a movie. Swimming at Buttermere by Char Cottage, he recalls: “The last time I swam here, a crew were filming Tom Cruise in a helicopter wile black clad parascenders swept down from High Crag; they were filming the next Mission Impossible film and were causing quite a stir in the valley. Their safety crew, riding sleek electric jet skis, were very friendly and accommodating and allowed us to swim in the bay as long as we stayed out of shot.”

While we may not all have the stunt prowess of Tom Cruise, there is safety to consider and Pete dedicates pages to mountain and water safety and the wild swimmers’ code. There is advice on avoiding areas of algal blooming and the importance of helping to reduce the spread of non-native, invasive New Zealand pygmy weed in lakes like Derwentwater by washing off and drying all gear, wetsuits and swimwear before reusing in another body of water.

When it comes to kit, he offers recommendations for swimmers’ safety and comfort, for example to go prepared for Bleaberry Tarn whose floor is “made of the sharpest and most awkward rock imaginable”, although he says it is worth it for the best swimming tarn in the Buttermere valley. Pete, Andrea and staff at Swim the Lakes can advise on necessary and recommended equipment.

One thing Pete is rarely without on a swim-hike is his ‘brew kit’ for those times where a welcoming pub or café is far away. Refreshments – especially hot ones – are important on outdoor adventures; as any wild swimmer knows even on the sunniest of days there is nothing like a brew to defrost fingers and toes.

Pete guiding on Helvellyn, and Red Tarn

All the walks come with recommendations, from tearooms to pubs, fish and chip shops to “posh tea and cake” (at Lancrigg Hotel), a pint of “well-kept ale by the stove” at Thorney How Hostel or at classic favourites like Dungeon Ghyll Hotel, both the Old and New. “Crucially for the mountain swimmer, The Old has that most essential of country pub features, a perpetually roaring fire,” he writes.

It is all part of the wellbeing offered by a day out on the fells, in woods or in the water, the blue-green therapy that is appreciated now more than ever. A swim at High Dam has it all. “This is a place we can call home for a while and the intimacy of the heather, dangling larch and old pine add to that feeling. Many a happy hour can be spent here, lazily swimming about the lily pads, gazing between the trees to the distant hazy fells,” he writes.

He says he has “pretty well done Cumbria to death” but has one swim he would like do – in the sea off a gravel bay near St Bees where, having paddled it in a kayak, he claims the water looks Mediterranean.

In the meantime, he is working on a book on the Yorkshire Dales, and with his wealth of knowledge he surely has plenty to fill a second book of swim-hikes in the Lake District.

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Wild Swimming Walks by Pete Kelly

Wild Swimming Walks Lake District (Wild Things Publishing, £14.99) is available from Swim the Lakes in Ambleside and online at swimthelakes.co.uk, as well from other local stockists including Fred Holdsworth’s Book Shop and Detail Retail in Ambleside, Westwood Books and The Sleepy Elephant in Sedbergh and the Heaton Cooper Studios in Grasmere. Information on organised swimming walks can be found at lakedistrictswimming.co.uk.