Kendal Mountain Festival 2026: a first-timer's field guide

For four days every November, Kendal stops being a market town on the way to the Lakes and becomes the centre of the outdoor world. This year it runs from Thursday 19 to Sunday 22 November 2026: more than 200 live sessions, 300 speakers, more than 165 films and a free village of tents and stages in Abbot Hall Park.

The first time, it can feel like a festival built for people who already know how it works. Regulars booked their tickets weeks ago, picked their seats and chose their pub. You don't need any of that. You need to know four things: the festival is spread across a whole town, the best of it is free, the ticketed parts reward a little planning, and the people you meet in the queue matter as much as the people on stage.

Why I keep going back

I've been going since 2015. We've never had a film in the programme, and that isn't why we go. For us, Kendal is the one weekend a year when our whole community is in one place: the people who make outdoor stories, the people who commission them and the people who watch them, all in the same few streets for four days.

This year we're there supporting Expedition HQ, and I've booked in for Lucy Shepherd, who we've made two films with for 66°North (True North is one), Cat Vinton, Leo Houlding, Snow Night and the YETI Film Night.

Kendal began in October 1980 as a two-day mountaineering film festival. It now hosts the Boardman Tasker Prize for mountain literature, an international film competition and a book festival. It is still, at heart, a town full of people who love the same thing, sitting in the dark together.

Three things I wouldn't miss

1. Opening night at Basecamp. At 5pm on Thursday a parade of lanterns, stilt walkers, music and cowbells leaves Abbot Hall Art Gallery and ends at Basecamp, where the festival is declared open. The atmosphere that night is the best of the weekend.
2. A music night. This year Fjällräven's Folk Night with Johnny and Lillie Flynn (Friday, 6pm, The Venue at the Barrel House) sold out before I got a ticket. Music and parties go fast, so book them the day they're released.
3. Outdoor Connections, if you work in the industry. The festival's industry summit runs on Thursday 19 November at Low Wood Bay on Windermere, 9am to 5pm, with socials in the evening. It's the best room of the week for meeting the people behind the brands, films and agencies. A delegate pass is £250 and includes a pass for five festival events.

The shape of the four days

The festival builds slowly on Thursday, peaks on Saturday night and lets you down gently on Sunday. Knowing that rhythm is most of the battle.

Thursday 19: the parade

Arrive in time for the parade at 5pm. It's dark by then, and it's the best possible way to arrive. Thursday is also the cheapest day pass, at £25. Reel Rock 20 and a live Q&A with Janja Garnbret are on that evening too, though the screening has already sold out.

Friday 20: settle in

Basecamp opens at 9.30am. Most first-timers try to see everything on Friday and are tired by Saturday. Pick two or three ticketed events, spend the gaps at Basecamp, and leave room to say yes when someone suggests a film you hadn't heard of. My Friday: Lucy Shepherd's talk, Into The Wild, in the Brewery Arts Malt Room at 1.30pm, then the YETI Film Night in Screen One at 6.30pm.

Saturday 21: the big day

Saturday is the fullest day and the busiest town. KendalPitch, new this year, runs at 6.15pm at The Venue: five emerging filmmakers pitch live for a £10,000 film grant. It's free, but you still need a ticket. The film awards follow at 7.45pm in the same room. If you only come for one day, come on Saturday.

My Saturday shows how to pace it, with Basecamp and lunch in the gaps:

• 9.45am: Cat Vinton in conversation with Sidetracked, in the Exhale Yurt at Basecamp.
• 1pm: Bear Grylls at the Leisure Centre.
• 4pm: Leo Houlding at the Brewery Arts Theatre.
• 8pm: Snow Night at the Leisure Centre, which has sold out.

Sunday 22: the long goodbye

Basecamp closes at 5pm. The festival ends with the Best of Kendal film collections at 5pm and 8pm, and the last of them winds down around 10.30pm. I'll be at Eloise Kane's talk on her book Wilderlands, in the Exhale Yurt at 3pm. The festival's own advice is to stay on Sunday night and take Monday off, and it's right.

Tickets: buy singles

Every event needs a ticket, even the free ones, and tickets live on your phone. Single tickets start at £7.50 for activities, £10.50 for films and book events, £14.50 for talks and £16.50 for music and parties. Each has a booking fee, and single tickets can't be cancelled, refunded or swapped.

Passes work differently. A weekend pass costs £205, and day passes are £25 on Thursday, £70 on Friday, £85 on Saturday and £45 on Sunday. New this year are Two-Together passes for two people and Under 18s passes. A pass has one booking fee instead of one per ticket, 48 hours' priority booking on each ticket release, and lets you cancel or swap an event up to 15 minutes before it starts.

I always buy single tickets. The choice is enormous, and a pass makes you plan the weekend around getting your money's worth. Pick the three or four things you came for, book them early, and leave the rest of the day for Basecamp and the people you meet there.

Three rules worth knowing:

• Be in your seat five minutes before the start, or your ticket can be cancelled and resold.
• Check the walk between venues before you book back-to-back events. Pass holders can't book two events that overlap.
• Screenshot your tickets. Signal in a full venue is not guaranteed.

Choosing films

This year's programme was picked from more than 650 entries to the festival's international film competition. More than 165 films will screen, including 26 world premieres, 48 UK premieres and 25 European premieres. That's more than anyone can see, so don't try.

Most of the programme comes as Film Collections: curated sets of short outdoor films shown together under one ticket. Alongside them are the feature films, the year's big outdoor documentaries. A few ways to choose:

• Start with one collection outside your own sport. If you climb, see the environment films. If you run, see the climbing. A collection is curated, so the films play off each other in a way a single short can't.
• See one feature on a big screen. It's what the festival was built for.
• Go to the awards on Saturday night. You'll find out which films the jury rated highest, with a day left to catch them.
• Use the Q&As. Some screenings end with the filmmakers or the people in the film on stage. They're often the best part.

Whatever you miss, you can usually catch later. Most festival films go on to the Kendal Mountain Player, the festival's streaming platform. Some are only ever shown live, though. If a film says it won't be on the Player, put it first.

The free side: Basecamp and the town

You could come to Kendal without a single ticket and have a full weekend. Basecamp, in Abbot Hall Park, is free to enter and three minutes' walk from the Brewery Arts Centre. It's open on Friday and Saturday from 9.30am to 7pm, and on Sunday from 9.30am to 5pm.

Its four stages host more than 70 free talks, panels and performances, with no tickets needed:

• The deuter Bothy Stage: Q&As with athletes, ambassadors and adventurers.
• The Osprey Adventure Stage: activism, creativity, adventure and local stories.
• The Passenger Gallery Stage: personal stories and practical advice. It's outdoors, so dress for it.
• The Pilgrim's Refuge: a quieter space for morning meditations and sessions on connection and belonging.

The Bothy and Adventure stages hand out Bluetooth headphones, so you can hear over the crowd. Around the tents are stands from outdoor brands, charities and organisations, the info desk, a book and merchandise shop and a food and drink village. Basecamp is the festival's living room. Arrange to meet people there.

The rest of the festival is spread across the town: the Leisure Centre (the biggest talks, in an 800-seat hall), the Brewery Arts Centre, the Town Hall, The Box at Kendal College, The Venue at the Barrel House, Bakery No.4, the Elsewhere Bar in Wainwright's Yard, and the climbing wall out on the business park. Much of the town centre sits in narrow yards off Highgate and Stricklandgate, and half the pleasure is walking between them.

This year also brings the first Dacia Drive-In Cinema, and a design and illustration competition with Northern Monk, Draw Your North. Entries close on Friday 13 November.

Getting there and getting around

Come by train if you can. Oxenholme Lake District station is on the West Coast Main Line, with direct trains from London, Manchester, Glasgow and Edinburgh. The connecting train into Kendal takes about seven minutes and runs regularly. Kendal station also has direct trains to Manchester Airport.

If you drive, park outside the centre. Town-centre parking is tight over the weekend, and the one-way system adds time. South Lakeland House car park on Kent Street stays open 24 hours from Thursday 19 until Monday 23 November. Mountain Rideshare, the festival's lift-share partner, matches drivers who have spare seats with people who need a lift.

Once you're there, walk. Most venues are a few minutes apart. The two exceptions are the Leisure Centre on Burton Road and the climbing wall on the business park, so allow extra time for those. Local bus fares are capped at £3. Brompton Bike Hire is giving £35 of hire credit with the code KENDALUNFOLDED, redeemable from 18 to 25 November, for the first 50 people.

All the main venues are wheelchair accessible. Wheelchair spaces and a free carer seat can be booked by emailing info@mountainfest.co.uk.

Where to stay if you've left it late

The centre of Kendal books up early. If you're reading this in November, three options are still worth checking:

• The DoJo. Kendal Judo Club becomes the festival's hostel and campervan site, with more than 50 beds in single-sex dorms, discounted family and group rooms, more than 40 campervan spaces and over ten tent pitches. Showers and breakfast are included. Book through the festival's Where to Stay page.
• Sizergh Caravan & Camping. About four miles out of town at Low Sizergh Farm, it opens for vans and tents over the festival weekend, weather permitting, and has a farm shop on site.
• Further out. Staveley, Burneside and Windermere are all on the branch line into Kendal, so a room there is a short train ride from the festival. Check the last train back before you book an evening film.

For years, our own answer was a night outside. We knew a quiet green lane outside town that runs up onto the fells. We'd drive up, camp for the night and be back in Kendal for coffee and breakfast the next morning. Some of those nights were very cold, but it was a real night in the hills instead of an overpriced hotel room. If you want to do something similar, do it properly: in the Lake District, wild camping needs the landowner's permission, not every lane is open to vehicles, and the festival asks campervans to use approved sites and never block roads or gateways.

Whatever you book, add Sunday night. The last films finish late, and the drive home in the November dark is the worst part of anyone's weekend.

What to wear and pack

Kendal in late November is wet, cold at the edges and dark by about four. You'll spend the day going between a cold park, warm crowded halls and wet streets. Dress for all three:

• A waterproof you don't mind carrying. You'll take it off in every venue.
• Layers, not one big coat. A packed hall is warm; the outdoor Gallery Stage and the walk between venues are not.
• Shoes that will walk two miles on wet cobbles. It's a walking festival, even if you never leave town.
• A charged phone and a battery pack. Your tickets are on it, and so is the map.
• A small bag and a water bottle. You'll carry them all day.
• Something to write on. You'll hear names, film titles and ideas you'll want to look up on the train home.

If the weather gives you a clear morning, take it. Scout Scar, the limestone edge just west of town, looks across to the Lakeland fells, and you can be up and back before the first screening.

Meeting people without pitching at them

Kendal is the closest thing the outdoor industry has to a conference, but it doesn't behave like one. People are there for the films first, and the conversations happen around them: in the queue, at the bar afterwards, on the walk between venues. If you make, commission or sell outdoor stories, that's the opportunity. It works best if you don't treat it as one.

What works:

• Talk about the film you've just seen. It's the one thing everyone in the room has in common, and the fastest way to find out what someone does.
• Go where the industry gathers. Outdoor Connections on Thursday, then KendalPitch and the awards on Saturday night, draw the filmmakers and much of the industry into one room. The festival also runs more than ten parties across the weekend.
• Ask questions in the Q&As, then say hello afterwards. A good question is a better introduction than a business card.
• Know your one line. When someone asks what you do, have a sentence ready that's about the work, not the job title.
• Follow up the week after, not the night of. A short note with a link to the film you talked about lands better than a pitch on Saturday night.

If you're a filmmaker starting out, watch KendalPitch even if you didn't enter. Five finalists pitch short films about nature, adventure, the environment and exploration to an international jury, live. Watching how they do it is a lesson in itself.

As for where to eat, I've never been consistent, with one exception: the kebab shop by the river. At this point it's a pilgrimage.

Your first Kendal, in ten lines

1. Book a bed, and add Sunday night.
2. Book the train to Oxenholme, or a lift through Mountain Rideshare.
3. Make a free account on the festival's ticketing site and save events before you buy.
4. Buy single tickets for the three or four things you'd hate to miss.
5. Book music nights and parties the day they're released.
6. Pick one Film Collection outside your own sport.
7. Screenshot every ticket.
8. Pack a waterproof, layers and shoes for wet streets.
9. Be at the parade at 5pm on Thursday, if you can get there.
10. Leave Friday afternoon free for Basecamp.

Questions people ask

Is it only for climbers?

No. The film awards alone cover climbing, mountains, sport, adventure and exploration, the environment, and community and culture. Plenty of the films aren't about sport at all.

Do I need a pass?

No. Single tickets suit most first-timers. A pass pays off if you're sure you'll fill several days, or you want the flexibility to cancel and swap. Basecamp's talks are free and need no ticket.

Can I bring children?

Yes. There are family films and family-friendly events, and children don't need a ticket for Basecamp. Speaker and film content isn't age-restricted, and many evening events aren't suitable for young children, so check the listing.

Can I bring my dog?

Not into the venues or the Basecamp tents; service dogs are the exception. The food village and outdoor spaces at Basecamp are dog-friendly.

What if an event is sold out?

Check again nearer the time. Pass holders can cancel up to 15 minutes before an event starts, and their seats go back on sale.

Can I watch from home?

Many of the films go on to the Kendal Mountain Player after the festival, and some independent cinemas around the UK screen a selection while it's on. Some films are only ever shown live in Kendal.

Photographs from Kendal Mountain Festival, used with permission. Checked against the festival’s programme and website on 9 November 2026; sold-out events were sold out on that date. Mentioned: True North.