A quintessentially English country inn. A roaring fire and very good food and wine. Could there be a more inviting prospect?
The Wild Boar Inn serves up all that… but there’s more.
There’s the setting: The Gilpin Valley, part way between Kendal and Bowness-on-Windermere in the World Heritage Lake District National Park.
The accommodation: Thirty-four boutique hotel bedrooms, with divine beds, quirky features such as copper baths, and books and lovely pictures…
The offering: The Grill & Smokehouse Restaurant serving the best of British food focused on fresh local produce including unique dishes incorporating the flavours from the onsite smokehouse. Seventy acres of private woodland with paths meandering past a tarn and myriad wildlife.
The staff: Charming, dedicated, proud and professional.
The Wild Boar is part of the English Lakes Hotels (founded in 1953 with the purchase of what is now the Low Wood Bay Resort & Spa on the shores of Windermere), and has itself been under the ownership of the family-owned business since 1959.
During those 70 years of hospitality, the group has won many awards and is a beacon for community initiatives, training and development, customer service, conservation and sustainability – always moving with the times and serving up an offering that, in its platinum anniversary year, could not provide any finer a blend of traditional values and contemporary chic.
Our two-day stay in early spring included dinner in the restaurant where we feasted on a shared mezze platter of marinated olives and ewe’s milk feta, hummus, smoked almonds, cheese-stuffed chillies and flat bread followed by a vat of Scottish mussels marinière and a 22-days aged fillet of prime beef (smoked in-house) each served with triple-cooked chips I still dream of.
The heritage: The inn, originally a 17th-century cottage, takes its name from the local legend of Sir Richard de Gilpin, who bravely fought and killed a ferocious wild boar.
The menu is filled with fantastic choices, so much so that on our second night we dined on it again, but this time in the convivial setting of the lounge where locals and residents and walkers, most of them with their dogs, eat and drink and talk. A confession – the portions are so bountiful I shared the second of my two bacon chops with two fellow (four-legged) guests, whose owners were eagerly awaiting for their dinners to arrive and looked on with approval and not a little envy.
Breakfast is another time of plenty with a splendid array of fruits and cereals and juices and porridge and pastries, and then all manner of cooked delights to set you up for a day’s hiking or biking or sight-seeing or pleasure cruising. Another choice from the superb kitchen is the alternative afternoon tea – out go the delicate finger sandwiches and in come treats including mini fish and chips, pork scratchings and pigs in blankets, but the scones with jam and cream are still there.
The Wild Boar is a splendid base for a break in the South Lakes. We did Bowness including a boat trip on Windermere, shopping and teashopping, driving on to see the first signs of spring on a very chill and blustery day. Then back to the Wild Boar where we nabbed the seats next to the roaring fire that will have burnt so brightly for so many guests over the centuries.
Before setting off for home we walked for a little way through the extensive grounds with thoughts of how much they will change with the seasons and how welcoming the Lakes are at any time of year. And how this is definitely a place to come back to again and again.
The Wild Boar, Crook Road, Windermere, Cumbria, LA23 3NF
First Published by Joanne Goodwin – https://www.greatbritishlife.co.uk/travel/23391160.hotel-review-wild-boar-inn-windermere-lake-district/
