The Windermere Jetty Museum, reopened in 2019 in a striking purpose-built lakeside complex of dark-wood pavilions, holds the world's most important collection of historic boats associated with a single lake. The stars are the Victorian and Edwardian steam launches — beautiful slender craft built for the wealthy mill owners and gentry who built houses around Windermere in the 19th century — and they are kept in working order: several can be taken out on the lake on summer weekends.
The main hall holds about forty boats, including the 1850 Dolly (one of the world's oldest surviving mechanically-powered boats), the 1898 Branksome, and the speed record-holder Miss Windermere IV. Beyond the boats, the museum tells the social story of the lake — the railway and the resort boom, the working watermen, the campaigns against speed boats. Workshops at the rear let you watch ongoing restoration. A short walk or steamer ride from Bowness pier.