Bakewell

Compact town, completely walkable (church and museum up a hill).

A typical Peak District stone town, with the usual Church, Museum, Shops, River, Old Bridge.

• 🌍 Haddon Hall (on the way, to Matlock, barely 5 minutes from Bakewell by car, well under an hour by (mostly) riverside path). A lovely medieval hall, expanded piecemeal over the centuries to give very organic and lived-in feel. 
• 🌍 Chatsworth House (a few miles from the town). The massive and spectacular late-17th-century stately home of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire (the inspiration for Pemberley from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, apparently), open to public, pay for parking but with free access to the surrounding area (flat riverside ambles, wooded hillside trails, famous fountain. Restaurants, at old stables, a cafe at the car park in the grounds. 
• Near Chatsworth in Pilsley is Chatsworth Farm Shop: plays heavily on noble connection: "Duke's cure bacon", "Duchy of Cornwall Biscuits", etc. (Mrs Bucket would shop here) but also popular because of huge range of good fresh fruit, veg and meat, and some exotic stuff not so easy to obtain elsewhere (venison, boar, etc.). Includes a tea shop.
• Monsal Dale. A deep picturesque dale complete with the Monsal trail, a disused railway line providing easy walking, cycling and horse riding. Enjoy going through the old tunnel and exiting on the 70-ft-high viaduct over the River Wye.

Museum, riverside walks, a weekly market on Monday and the agricultural market on various other days. Bakewell is a great base for a Peak District walking weekend, with lovely walks all round (easy riverside, meandering field paths, gentle hill walking, or strenuous crag hopping). Bus to Rowsley for trip on "Peak Rail" steam train to Matlock

Usual "country" things: good outdoor shops, discount books, fresh food. Excellent shop specialising in Scotch Whisky. Take home an original "Bakewell pudding" or "Derbyshire oatcakes".

• Bakewell pudding. An English dessert consisting of a flaky pastry base with a layer of sieved jam and topped with a filling made of egg and almond paste. There are excellent tea shops abound, several claiming to serve the genuine (or original etc.). (updated Jan 2024)
• Bakewell tart. (updated Jan 2024)

Lots of pubs, some feel traditional, some a little more "mass market". Nearly all serve real ale. Plenty of choice, all the central pubs and hotels offer food.

• 🌍 The Manners Hotel, Haddon Road, ☏ +44 1629 812756. Serves food during the day. 
• 🌍 The Queen's Arms, Bridge Street, ☏ +44 1629 814586. Serves food during the day. 
• 🌍 The Red Lion, The Square, ☏ +44 1629 812054. Serves food during the day. 
• 🌍 The Wheatsheaf, Bridge Street, ☏ +44 1629 812985. Serves food during the day. 

Many B&Bs in town, or in surrounding farms. Many pubs do accommodation.

• 🌍 The Rutland Arms Hotel, The Square, ☏ +44 1629 812812. Serves food 
• 2 Everton Holiday Cottage. Haddon Road. A spacious yet cosy Edwardian cottage just a short stroll from the centre of Bakewell. Sleeps 7. +44 7967755801.
• 🌍 The Peacock Hotel, Market Street, ☏ +44 1629 813635. Serves food during the day. 
• 🌍 Castle Inn, Castle Street, ☏ +44 1629 812103. Serves food all day. 
• 🌍 Bolehill Farm Cottages (Peak District Cottages), Monyash Road Bakewell (2 Miles From Bakewell), ☏ +44 1629 812359. Check-in: 3PM, check-out: 10AM. Eight Peak District self-catering cottages that are converted farm buildings set in courtyard surrounded by rural landscape 2 miles from Bakewell. from £180. 
• 🌍 The Cavendish, Church Lane, Baslow DE45 1SP, ☏ +44 1246 582311. Stylish hotel on the Chatsworth Estate, great comfort, service and cuisine. Assistance dogs only. B&B double £140. (updated Jul 2020)
• 🌍 Fischer's Baslow Hall, Calver Rd, Baslow DE45 1RR, ☏ +44 1246 583259. Gorgeous hotel in Edwardian manor, great style and cuisine. No dogs. B&B double £260. (updated Jul 2020)
• 🌍 The Peacock at Rowsley, Bakewell Rd, Rowsley DE4 2EB, ☏ +44 1629 733518. Hotel in a 17th-century manor house, part of the Haddon Hall estate. Occasional lapses in the cuisine but mostly to a high standard. B&B double £220. (updated Jun 2020)

As of March 2024, Bakewell and its approach roads have 4G from O2, Three and Vodafone, and 5G from EE.

Bakewell is the local centre, so has very good connections with local towns and villages (lots of small buses). It is situated in superbly beautiful limestone ("White Peak") scenery: green fields, stone walls, sheep, rounded hills topped by horizontal lines of limestone crags. Some of the best walking country in England, makes local places easily accessible on an afternoon stroll.

• Many, many nearby villages nearly all worth a trip by bus or car or on foot, and most have a pub or tea shop. Examples include Over Haddon, Monyash, Ashford in the Water and Youlgr(e)ave with two names.
• Matlock is 15 minutes by car, and there are also buses, and a steam train from Rowsley. Another Peak District town, a little less cute than Bakewell (preferred by some because of that), with usual shops and pubs and a pleasant riverside town park with a little lake (try lawn bowls – "Crown Green Bowling").
• Matlock Bath is just beyond Matlock. Strange "seaside" feel, almost as far inland as you can get in England, cable cars to hilltop caves and popular meeting place for motorcyclists at the weekend, worth visiting to see hundreds of bikes lined up along the main street.
• Cromford is a mile beyond Matlock Bath. A tiny town in a green setting, yet its main draw is "Arkwright's Mill" from the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, the first large factory (water-powered cotton spinning mill) in the modern world. Also the Cromford Canal is a lovely waterway in a very rural setting – but not yet reconnected to the English canal network, so few boats.