Beatrix Potter's Lakes legacy

Hidden away on the western side of Lake Windermere in England's Lake District is a little 14th century village that hasn't changed for centuries.

The Lake District is one of the country's most popular destinations, receiving 19 million tourists a year. But while many of the area's towns and villages have modernised to accommodate tourists, Near Sawrey remains exactly as it was when Beatrix Potter bought into it in 1905, determined to conserve it as it always was. She paid for her first village property, Hill Top Farm, with the royalties from her first books.

Most people need little introduction to Potter. Her 28 books have sold in their tens of millions around the world. The Tale of Peter Rabbit, her first book published in 1901, has sold 45 million copies alone. Even now four books are sold every minute somewhere in the world.

You've probably got at least one. My family has two copies of most of her books plus a full presentation gift set I bought for my daughter that she hasn't even opened yet. When I told her I was going to Potter Country she assured me she would begin reading the set to her firstborn when he turns three.

I first went to The Lakes, as they're affectionately known in England, with my brother on a rock-climbing expedition. Unfortunately our tent beneath Scafell Pike, England's highest mountain, was all but washed away by a storm on the first night, prompting a soggy and sheepish departure early the following morning. I've since been back six times, climbing, walking, fishing and photographing the landscape and villages - notably the Sawreys. That's plural for there are two, Near Sawrey and Far Sawrey, though they're only 1km apart.

Potter discovered The Lakes as a girl, spending long summer holidays around Windermere with her parents, and dreamt of owning a rustic cottage there.

In Victorian England, society did not expect much of women, save to marry as best they could and have babies. Even the daughters of wealthy families, considered one step above most women of the era, had few rights and were expected to do what they were told by their parents. When Potter was born in 1866, women were not even permitted to own property.

While Potter was fortunate to be born into a wealthy Victorian family and was raised in their London mansion by a governess and a nanny, she was determined to make her own way in life. She seldom saw her brother Bertie, who was packed off to boarding school, so she had plenty of spare time to entertain herself, secretly bringing home mice, rabbits, and hedgehogs.

It was during the summer holidays around the Sawreys that she began to blossom. There she met a writer named Hardwicke Rawnsley, the Vicar of Wray, who would later become honourable secretary of the National Trust. Their shared interest in The Lakes, conservation, wildlife, writing and painting, and his encouragement that she should follow her heart, helped shape her future.

She illustrated her first book for children in her mid-20s but it took another 10 years and the encouragement of Rawnsley before she published her first book - The Tale of Peter Rabbit - based on her observations of a real rabbit that lived in her garden. It was a success and three more books quickly followed.

As her fame and wealth as a writer and illustrator of books about animals grew, she built on her dreams and continued to buy properties in and around the Sawreys to preserve them for future generations. She gifted them all - 1620ha with 17 farms and eight cottages - to the National Trust on her death in 1943, aged 77, on condition that they remained working farms. It was the single largest gift the Trust had ever received.

Apart from her success as a writer of animal books, Potter is also recognised as an accomplished botanical illustrator, sheep breeder and farmer. She effectively single-handedly saved from extinction Herdwick sheep, an ancient breed introduced to the Lake District by Norse settlers a thousand years ago and long since found nowhere else.

Given the extraordinary influence this Victorian woman has had, not only in the country she loved but throughout the world, it is hardly surprising so many tourists visit the Lake District specifically to see her legacy.

One of the largest groups of overseas visitors comes from Japan, where Potter's books are used widely as early reading books for children. More than 70,000 Japanese visit each year. You might think the narrow roads around Near Sawrey would be punctuated with coach parks; they're not. That's because Potter stipulated, and the National Trust agreed, that her properties remain as they were when she bequeathed them. There are no ugly coach parks or any other signs of the 21st century in or around the village - apart from a couple of discreet road signs deemed necessary for everyone's safety. After dropping off their tourists, coach drivers must leave the area and only return to pick them up later.

Around Near Sawrey are several buildings featured in Potter's books. For example, the Tower Bank Arms, a delightful dog-friendly pub with very fine hand-pumped ale and four charming guest bedrooms, is featured in The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck (page 42). There used to be matching ornaments either side of the porch but I reversed over one on my last visit, so the one I replaced it with doesn't quite match. Ooops! Fortunately publican Anthony Hutton is the perfect host. He dismissed my accident with a wave of the hand.

When I first stayed in the pub I casually inquired about where one might catch a trout. He immediately gave me a fishing permit for local waters gratis, lent me his waders, provided a shot of brandy (it was unseasonably cold that day) and even drove me up the hill overlooking the village to fish in the rhododendron-fringed Moss Eccles Tarn (local dialect for a lake) which is stocked with trout. (For the fishermen: I caught two fine brown trout of about 1kg each, one on a coachman and the second, after it started to rain, on a brown beaded nymph.)

So delightful is the Tower Bank Arms that my wife and I have stayed there four times over the past few years.

A couple of hundred metres from the pub is Hill Top Farm, the first of Potter's acquisitions. Despite the house being open to visitors as a time capsule to the author's life, it is still a working farm where Pete the National Trust gardener grows organic vegetables in the cottage garden. Hill Top Farm is open from Easter until the end of October and in high summer is very busy. Tickets cannot be bought in advance so the Trust operates a timed-ticket system to avoid overcrowding and to protect the interior.

By far the most relaxed way to see the village and walk the beautiful countryside with its many lakes set amid ancient beech woods, is to stay at one of Near Sawrey's five guesthouses and pubs, though I personally can't go past the Tower Bank Arms. Esthwaite Water is only a 10-minute walk, while Lake Windermere is just a 20-minute stroll away.