Start at Rydal Road Car Park. As you leave Ambleside, the story begins with how this small market town became the gateway to the Lakes.
Wordsworth's home for 37 years. You'll hear why he moved here and what he wrote while he lived here.
The road follows the shore of one of the smallest lakes in the National Park.
Park and stretch your legs in the village Wordsworth called 'the loveliest spot that man hath ever found'. Dove Cottage (Wordsworth Grasmere) is a short walk away; entry not included.
Cross the pass and hear the legend of King Dunmail, the last king of Cumbria, said to be buried under the cairn.
One of the few buildings left after the valley was flooded to make the Thirlmere reservoir that supplies Manchester.
Walk among 38 stones set up by Neolithic farmers around 5,000 years ago, with a 360° view of the fells. One of the most dramatically placed stone circles in Britain.
Stop on the shore of Ullswater, the lake many people think is the most beautiful in England.
Hear how this small lake got its name as you drive up the valley.
Pull in at the top of the highest road pass in the Lake District, then drop back down to Ambleside.
This self drive tour was brilliant, it was easy to use and the guide on the app was great! We learnt a lot while driving through the lakes and he was spot on with little comments he made about people being in the road and funny bits like that! I’d really recommend this and looking forward to finding other similar tours for other places we visit!
What a great idea! Downloaded the guide on to my phone and played it through the car. Easy to follow directions and visited lots of places that we would never have found if we were driving around by ourselves.
The route and views were good, but the narration is flat and dull. Better than trying to read a guide or hiring someone at great cost, nice idea but needs work. Better than nothing. Once we got half way around and the return was obvious, we stopped listening. No, I don't want to pull in a carpark and sit while listening to more about the area, what a boring idea. It would have been better to focus on views and experiences and cover any background narrative during the driving sections. We only listened to the first carpark stop. The voicemap app isn't great. It won't let you start at any point in the route, you have to be at the beginning. Exactly in the right part of a carpark in this case.
Brilliant self guided tour. The family thoroughly enjoyed the ride out in the car, where we visited sites we would never have known about. Superb value for money.
This guide was just a very simple list of directions and place names lacking any local details or history or added information that you can’t see on a map. It was not worth it. The navigation between points was also disjointed.
We recently did this self-drive tour around the Lakes and honestly couldn’t recommend it enough. Being able to pause whenever we wanted made such a difference because we could really take in the scenery, stop for photos, grab a coffee, or explore somewhere that caught our eye without feeling rushed. What we loved most was that it took us to places we never would have discovered on our own. We saw so many beautiful spots, hidden gems, and breathtaking views that we probably would have driven straight past otherwise. The information throughout the tour was top notch — interesting, clear, and really added to the whole experience. The GPS guidance was spot on from start to finish, which made everything completely stress free. It genuinely felt like we experienced so much of the Lakes in a way that was relaxed, immersive, and memorable. A fantastic way to explore the area and we’d absolutely do another one.
Amazing views, ............excellent couple of days........................................................
Great value audio guide. We loved this self drive audio guide. Very informative, takes you to places you would otherwise miss.
Great tour, easy to follow instructions and we found places in Lake district we never been before. Would definitely recommend
Rubbish don’t waste your money! Just kept sending us to car parks that were full. Then didn’t keep up to where we were. Spent half the time trying to get it caught up. Utterly useless! Won’t be doing it again I’m afraid.
This tour was a great way to easily and affordably take in many beautiful areas of the Lake District simply by following the audio directions. Martin, a native of the region, is humorous and extremely informative, and we loved being able to start and stop(and occasionally rewind if we missed a turn) whenever we wanted or needed to. We experienced sites we never would have without this audio guide. I highly recommend this tour.
Once we got use to how to operate the self audio as we used it in the car - it was really good , nice to learn as we drove . An indication on how long it takes at each stop approx or suggested timings would help as we ran out of time to complete the whole tour
Unfortunately, the tour/app didn't sync with our navigation. We had to manually change to the next episode. Finding car parks were a pain to find. Each one cost to park up. More stressful than enjoyable. We ended up driving around the lakes and that was more relaxing and fun! Good idea but needs improving.
This one of the best tour you can have for the first time visit to the Lake District. Very well planned and extremely clear in the language and direction. It’s gives you the background knowledge of the place and the parking of the car. The route roads are very scenic and the directions are clear. There was no issues throughout the tour. Extremely pleased and would 100% recommend to everyone.
Great for planning your own guided tour and a pace to suit your individual itinerary. Very informative local knowledge with routes and minor roads that we wouldn't normally go along. Well worth the price and plenty of great scenery along the way. We enjoyed Aira Force Waterfall and trail. Useful information on places to stop and park. Only thing to improve would be the map navigation and location indicator as at times seemed off track but that's more to do with the app and not the guide.
The weather was awful, so it was great that we could pick and chose where we wanted to stop (rain permitting) and what we would keep for later. The tour took us to places with wonderful scenery that otherwise we would not have found. Great app, VoiceMap worked seamlessly, I can highly recommend it. Thanks for all the effort Martin Wilson put into this.
We couldn't book a tour as it was fully booked so decided to give this a try. The commentary is brilliant and the route is very scenic - wouldn't have come across these places but thanks to the guide, we were able to see some gorgeous views of Lake District. Few improvements would have made it better: 1. Map GPS is not the most accurate, it's hard to tell when to turn and we made a few wrong turns 2. You can't rotate the map to landscape mode. Not ideal when you are driving and you only have phone holder that's suitable for that
Brilliant product, took us through some beautiful spots. Most informative commentary. Would be useful to highlight that the duration listed is only the driving time, and the actual time taken can be a lot more when you make the recommended stops. Also, please highlight that good eateries along the way are recommended, so one need not worry about provisioning food. Glad I got it. Added great value to our visit.
Best £10 I've spent in years. Even with my tired old Android phone I was able to follow the tour easily. We were able to start and stop at our own pace and it took is to some great places we'd never have tripped over without doing a bunch of research. We got just enough background info on each significant spot to make us feel engaged and educated. Some folks might already know a lot of what was said but for us it was just perfect. I plan to be buying both the other voicemap tours for this area and will definitely come back for others as we wander about. If you're a hardcore afficionado of the area, the content might be a bit basic. But we're not and it really wasn't. Having the backstory and context for the beautiful sights and scenery around us was a real bonus. So pleased I tripped over the app. Made for a great day out.
Really good way to learn about a region and leave the beaten track. Well worth the cost. It was great
Ambleside is lovely, I imagine it must get very busy in the summer. It wasn’t too busy when we were there in October. Like most Lake District towns, there seems to be a lot of outdoor clothing shops but still a nice place to visit.
This tour was brilliant. It took a little getting used to as the instructions are a little sparse to start with but once you get going it's easy to understand. We went to so many hidden spots we'd never have seen as we aren't local. The sights were stunning, especially the the kirkstone pass Inn and the little layby beside ullswater lake. An amazing day out! We spent 6 hours doing this your as we got out to see everything! I would recommend taking ALOT of change ready for the car parks as there are alot of pay and display car parks on the tour (though you can skip them if you don't want to explore the area). One of the best days of our holiday!! Thanks Martin!!
This tour was an amazing way to see the Lake District. It took you to spectacular places and gave you a rundown on that place. The day we took the tour it was raining so it was very helpful to be guided along every road and turn point. I would highly recommend this tour.
Bought this yesterday and did the tour. Was very good. Lovely drive around the lakes and saw a few places we would not have seen. 😁
This guided tour is an absolute MUST if you want to get the most out of this wonderful area. Martin's unparalled local knowledge combined with the astonishing GPS driven app allowed us to confidently venture up and down some of the most challenging and off the beaten track roads I have ever driven on. I can't recommend it highly enough.
Nice route, worked well with the starting point and parking. Along the way lots of practical information about parking spaces and stops for drinks. Maybe a little too much. Poets and writers from 1700-1800 are not really my interest. Then you've lost me. The walk to the Cave was very rewarding. Technically difficult that switching to Google maps or Waze worked nicely and the co-driver had to navigate on phone screen instead of on the screen in the car. First time we used VoiceMap. Maybe it was just us. Last stretch of road closure, alternative was very nice.
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