Cumbria
The Lake District
England's highest mountains and deepest lakes, the landscape of Wordsworth and Beatrix Potter
Beauty Spots
National Parks, Landscapes & Famous Views
Britain has some of the most beautiful countryside in the world: National Parks from the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales to the New Forest, and a string of National Landscapes, the new name (since November 2023) for what used to be called Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, such as the Northumberland Coast, the High Weald and the Surrey Hills. Our guides to its great beauty spots, region by region, tell their history and show you the best walks, wildlife and views, with the gardens and villages nearby.
North
Yorkshire
The Yorkshire Dales
Limestone cliffs, green valleys of stone barns and the great viaduct at Ribblehead
Yorkshire
The North York Moors
Purple heather, steam trains through the dales and the ruins of Rievaulx Abbey
Northumberland
The Northumberland Coast
Holy Island, ruined castles on the cliffs and puffins on the Farne Islands
Northumberland
Hadrian's Wall Country
The Roman frontier striding along the crags, with forts, lakes and dark skies
East
Derbyshire
The Peak District
Britain's first National Park: gritstone edges, limestone dales and Chatsworth
Norfolk & Suffolk
The Norfolk Broads
Lakes dug by medieval hands, windmills, reed beds and 120 miles of rivers to explore by boat
Norfolk
The Norfolk Coast
Vast beaches, pinewoods, salt marshes and the winter skeins of pink-footed geese
Essex & Suffolk
Dedham Vale & Constable Country
The water meadows and mills that John Constable painted, still almost unchanged
Suffolk
The Suffolk Coast & Heaths
Heather heaths, a town lost to the sea, avocets at Minsmere and the music of Aldeburgh
South
Hampshire
The New Forest
William the Conqueror's hunting forest, where ponies still roam free
East Sussex
Beachy Head & Birling Gap
Britain's highest chalk sea cliff, two lighthouses and the Seven Sisters
East Sussex
Ashdown Forest & the High Weald
Open heathland on the High Weald, a royal hunting forest and Winnie-the-Pooh's Hundred Acre Wood
East & West Sussex
Downland Landmarks
The Long Man, Chanctonbury Ring, Devil's Dyke and Ditchling Beacon
London
Richmond Park
London’s largest royal park, with free-roaming red and fallow deer
Surrey
Box Hill & the Surrey Hills
The Surrey Hills' most famous viewpoint, with box woods and the picnic of Jane Austen's Emma
Isle of Wight
The Isle of Wight & the Needles
Three chalk stacks and a lighthouse at the end of a great white down
Kent
The White Cliffs of Dover
England's most famous cliffs, with a clifftop walk to a Victorian lighthouse
West Sussex
Chichester Harbour
Creeks, salt marshes and sailing villages, with the dunes of East Head at the harbour mouth
West Sussex
Kingley Vale
One of Europe's finest yew forests, with trees up to 2,000 years old
West
Devon
Dartmoor
Granite tors, wild ponies, clapper bridges and the moor of the Baskervilles
Somerset & Devon
Exmoor
Heather moors meeting the sea, red deer, Tarr Steps and the valley of Lorna Doone
Dorset & Devon
The Jurassic Coast
185 million years of Earth's history laid out along 96 miles of cliffs, arches and coves
The Cotswolds
The Cotswolds
England's largest National Landscape: honey-coloured villages built on the wealth of wool
Worcestershire & Herefordshire
The Malvern Hills
A switchback ridge with views over thirteen counties, Elgar's hills and Malvern water
Scotland
Highland
The Isle of Skye
The Cuillin ridge, the pinnacles of the Storr and the strange landscape of the Quiraing
Highland
Glencoe
Scotland's most famous glen, guarded by Buachaille Etive Mòr and the Three Sisters
Highland
Loch Ness & the Great Glen
A vast dark loch in the Great Glen, Urquhart Castle and the legend of Nessie
Argyll & Stirling
Loch Lomond & the Trossachs
Scotland's first National Park: the bonnie banks of Loch Lomond and the lochs of the Trossachs
Cairngorms
The Cairngorms
The UK's largest National Park: arctic mountains, ancient pinewoods and the only reindeer herd in Britain
Wales
Gwynedd
Eryri (Snowdonia)
All fifteen of the highest mountains in Wales, with lakes, waterfalls and a railway to the summit
Powys
Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons)
Pen y Fan, the Waterfall Country and some of the darkest skies in Britain
Pembrokeshire
The Pembrokeshire Coast
Britain's only coastal National Park: golden coves, sea cliffs and puffins on Skomer
Swansea
Gower
The UK's first Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty: Rhossili Bay and the tidal Worms Head
Anglesey
Anglesey Coast
Seabird cliffs at South Stack, a lovers' island at Llanddwyn and the castle at Beaumaris
Northern Ireland
County Antrim
The Giant's Causeway & Causeway Coast
40,000 basalt columns stepping into the sea, and the legend of the giant Finn McCool
County Antrim
The Glens of Antrim
Nine green glens running down to the sea, with waterfalls in Glenariff
County Down
The Mourne Mountains
The highest mountain in Ulster, a stone wall over fifteen summits and the hills of Narnia
County Down
Strangford Lough
The largest sea inlet in the British Isles, with famous gardens and winter geese
County Fermanagh
Marble Arch Caves & Cuilcagh
Boat trips on an underground river and a boardwalk across the blanket bog to Cuilcagh
Facts checked October 2026. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each guide. See also: Villages & Towns.