Oxford and Cotswolds Tour with Country Pub Lunch from London
Description
Visit two of England’s must-see destinations in one day on this small-group tour to Oxford and the Cotswolds. Take in the pretty countryside scenery of Cotswold villages including Burford, Bibury and Stow-on-the-Wold and stroll among the secluded cloisters, dreaming spires, and historic colleges of Oxford, and admire the Divinity School’s impressive medieval architecture. Travel in a small group with your guide for a more personal experience, and reach parts of the pretty countryside the larger coaches can’t pass.
Tour Options
Itinerary
Our day trip from London begins with a visit to Oxford, city of dreaming spires. Here, follow your guide in the footsteps of famous alumni such as author J. R. R. Tolkien, poet and playwright Oscar Wilde, and renowned physicist Stephen Hawking. Wander down narrow back streets to ancient colleges and pretty quadrangles, and soak up the atmosphere in this bustling university city. You’ll also visit Oxford University's oldest classroom — the medieval Divinity School. When your walking tour comes to an end, enjoy free time to explore at your leisure before we head to the stunning Cotswolds.
Our first stop is delightful Burford with stone houses cascading down to the River Windrush, see Woolsack tombs in the historic churchyard before we stop for a delicious lunch in a traditional Cotswolds country pub. Sit back and relax in an ancient stone hostelry and experience centuries-old tavern life in a world where a gentle, slower pace is the norm. We then visit Bibury with its collection houses known as Arlington Row, before driving through stunning centuries old villages with photo stops along the beautiful Coln Valley. Our smaller vehicles are able to travel up the narrow valley on single track roads, passing fields of sheep, historic churches and sleepy hamlets. Our last stop is bustling Stow-on-the-Wold with its vibrant market square, before driving back to London passing through Chipping Norton and Woodstock. The Tour duration is 10 hours including the remaining 3 hours for travel time
Highlights
What's included
Traveller Ratings
Important Information
- Public transportation options are available nearby
- Suitable for all physical fitness levels
- The Tour duration is set for 11 hours including the 5 hours for travel time
- British weather can be variable and so guests are advised to check the weather forecast and dress appropriately. It is recommended to bring some warm clothes with you especially in the winter months and layers are good for adapting to the ever-changing weather conditions. It is a good idea to wear appropriate footwear as there is walking involved on our tours. England is known for its rain so it is advisable to bring a waterproof jacket or umbrella with you.
- On Sundays this tour will run in reverse, starting with a tour of the Cotswolds and ending in Oxford. This is so the local shops are open when we arrive in Oxford.
- Please note that The Divinity School may close on short notice, in these circumstances, we will include a visit to an alternative college if available.
Reviews(10)
Our tour from Southampton to London via the Cotswolds and Oxford was expensive and was basically a waste of a whole day. We only saw one row of houses in one town and a main street in another. I must say that the Pub lunch was delicious. Too much time was spent in Oxford touring different colleges. We met the tour guide at our ship at 7:30 and didn’t get to our hotel until 7 pm because of traffic. Our tour guide was good (although he left us at 4:00) and the driver was excellent. We could have taken a port transfer to our hotel for $65 US. I do not recommend this tour…BIG disappointment!
Toby is a knowledgeable and engaging guide. We don't like large tour groups and this was the perfect size for us.
Tony, our guide, was fabulous and truly made this tour exceptional! He and our bus driver (who was also excellent) had a good working relationship, and the 2 of them added a couple of quick scenic photo stops, which weren’t included in our tour! I would highly recommend this excursion!
Our fabulous guide Tony went above and beyond to show us unscheduled places that we enjoyed! Friends international was the way to go and request Tony
Our guide Catharine and our driver Iman did their best to make the most of a bad situation. It poured down rain in Oxford, yet Catharine managed to show us the key points of the University. The Pub lunch was very good, and we enjoyed our photo stops in Burford and Bilbury. Unfortunately, we were stuck behind a major road accident on our way back to London. Even though we were later arriving back into London, they made sure that we were able to get back to our hotels. Very knowledgeable and professional.
We had an outstanding day touring the Cotswolds and Oxford from London. Because the tour was a small group tour instead of a larger coach-type tour, we were able to visit a mix of popular and off-the-beaten path places including a very special village where we were graciuosly welcomed to view the inside their beautiful historic church (St. Kenelm’s completed in 1450) just after Sunday service. Lunch was in an elegant village pub (The Lamb Inn, Burford), the food and service could not have been better. A stop in Oxford to see and experience some of the town’s notable highlights completed the day. Our tour guide was extremely knowledgeable, kind, and ensured our comfort throughout the day with stops that included available restrooms and food/drink. This was truly one of the best days of our trip, and we would most definitely take this tour again.
We were only 2 in the tour so we could stop everywhere we wanted. We had a wonderful time with Steve, our guide, and Vugar, our driver. They were very knowledgeable and they pampered us all day. We loved the tour of the Cotswolds, the lunch at the pub was delicious. The visit of Oxford was a little too superficial for our taste. It was just enough for us to realise that we could spend a whole day there some day.
Why did we travel to England? To experience the Cotswolds. This extremely poorly-run tour ruined our dream of experiencing the Cotswolds. The tour guide, Tony, was obviously seething with disgust for all people conservative, and let it be known loud and clear in his running political commentary which lasted the entire tour. This, coupled with the fact that the vast majority of time on this tour was taken up by an extreme amount of driving between far-apart Cotswolds villages - not scenic, just tiring hours of driving, ruined what we most looked forward to on our vacation. The tour took us to stow-on-wold for lunch. Didn't get to walk around village, took an hour for lunch including getting waited on, receiving food & eating. It wasn't one of the better villages to see anyway, so shouldn't have wasted our time even going to this village with all the time spent driving to and from Stow-on-Wold. Burton would have been a wonderful village to have allowed us to spend 2-3 hours strolling, wandering, imagining and having lunch. Visitors want leisure time to do these things to really soak in the beauty and ambience of a beautifully representative Cotswolds village like Burton - without rushing. Instead we drove past it even though it was NOT crowded. It would have been much more enjoyable spending our time leisurely breathing in the ambience and sights of just a couple quintessential Cotswolds villages, rather than spending the vast majority of time driving boring roads in between distant villages. Instead of commentary on the history or beauty of what we were seeing, the tour guide continually made political slurs. When the participants on the tour asked any question about how England accomplished something we were seeing, the tour guide turned it into a political hit piece against conservatives. We came a long distance, took time away from other things, and paid a lot of money for a vacation. In Oxford, we wanted to learn about the history and interesting facts about Oxford and it's people. Instead, we had to listen to the tour guide's political lambasting, and worse, when the tour guide turned us loose for a short period to explore, he failed to tell us what there was to see, what were the interesting things to look for, and where to find them. People were wandering around lost, trying to figure out which way to go and what to look at. It was a total waste of our time. In addition to the running political monologue, he made other inappropriate and offensive comments throughout the day such as referring to the poor gentleman who missed our tour bus as "a vegetable". (The gentleman and his wife had missed our tour bus, and later connected up with us). The tour guide repeatedly exclaimed, when talking in a derogatory manner about something, "Jesus Christ!" as an expletive. This is extremely offensive to Christians. No one wants to be subjected to a scathing, ongoing political lambasting while on a tour. That, coupled with the endless driving between distant Cotswolds villages, and failure to allow us to spend a good amount of leisurely time exploring a quintessential village or two, and turning us loose with no map and no explanation as to what to see in Oxford, ruined the most important part of our vacation.
TOUR What was the primary reason we visited England? To experience the Cotswolds. This extremely poorly-run tour ruined our dream of experiencing the Cotswolds. The tour guide, Tony, was obviously seething with disgust for all people conservative, and let it be known loud and clear in his running leftist political commentary which lasted the entire tour. This, coupled with the fact that the vast majority of time on this tour was taken up by an extreme amount of driving between far-apart Cotswolds villages - not scenic, just tiring hours of driving, ruined what we most looked forward to on our vacation. The tour took us to stow-on-wold for lunch. Didn't get to walk around village, took an hour for lunch including getting waited on, receiving food & eating. Wasn't one of the better villages to see anyway, so shouldn't have wasted our time even going to this village with all the time spent driving to and from Stow-on-Wold. Burton would have been a wonderful village to have allowed us to spend 2-3 hours strolling, wandering, imagining and having lunch. Visitors want leisure time to do these things to really soak in the beauty and ambience of a beautifully representative Cotswolds village like Burton - without rushing. Instead we drove past it even though it was NOT crowded. It would have been much more enjoyable spending our time leisurely breathing in the ambience and sights of just a couple quintessential Cotswolds villages, rather than spending the vast majority of time driving boring roads in between distant villages. Instead of commentary on the history or beauty of what we were seeing, the tour guide continually made leftist political slurs. When the participants on the tour asked any question about how England accomplished something we were seeing, the tour guide turned it into a political commentary against conservatives. The tour guide said the current prime Minister who's conservative is bad & going to lose the upcoming election. He said England needs immigrants, needs workers, Brits won't do mundane work. That Britain should implement a much greater increase in immigration. He said that Angela Merkel got it. (The adults in the room are keenly aware of the horrors of crime that infiltrated Germany with Merkel's open borders policy). When looking at windmills, the tour guide said that windmills are great and it takes thinking & planning to implement them. The tour guide needs to educate himself about the disaster that windmills are, starting with slave labor to extract the materials from the earth, depleting precious natural resources to build them, disastrous carbon footprint transporting them, destruction of wildlife, and the negative offset in the net generation of energy vs no windmills, to name a few. The tour guide brought up a couple times during the tour that the current conservative prime minister changed the upcoming election dates in order to prevent voters who vote for the opposition party from voting. One of the times the tour guide talked about this was while touring Oxford when the tour guide stated the current conservative prime minister is intentionally preventing college students from voting bc they would vote for the opposition party. The guide said the way the prime minister is doing it is that the students are registered to vote at this Oxford college location. And knowing the students leave in summer to go home - that's when the prime minister changed voting to, so the students will be out of their voting district and won't be able to vote. We came a long distance, took time away from other things, and paid a lot of money for a vacation. In Oxford, we wanted to learn about the history and interesting facts about Oxford and it's people. We got very little of that, and worse, when the tour guide turned us loose for a short period to explore, he failed to tell us what there was to see, what were the interesting things to look for, and where to find them. People were wandering around lost, trying to figure out which way to go and what to look at. It was a total waste of our time. The tour guide said he can't narrate in front of one of the specific Oxford colleges - bc his narration included the fact Boris Johnson had been a student at that college. He said the college told him they don't want to damage their reputation of excellence. Which party was Boris Johnson? Conservative. When asked a simple question as to whether Oxford University offers courses in art, he answered yes, but the prime minister (who is conservative) is trying to stop that because he views it as worthless & he only wants science and math and courses like that. Nearly every question the tour participants asked, the tour guide turned into an opportunity to take a punch at conservatives, instead of giving us information about the history and beauty of what we were seeing. In his ongoing, leftist political commentary, the tour guide criticized the current conservatives in government bc he said they're requiring voter i.d. for the purpose of trying to prevent people who would vote for the opposition from voting. The tour guide said there's only ever been 4 voter fraud cases in the entire country and therefore no voter ID for anyone should be required. He sarcastically lambasted the conservatives for requiring voter ID. (Wow. ID is required to get discounts for some items, for entry into or membership in some businesses, to buy alcohol, etc, but shouldn't be required for the most fundamental and important role a CITIZEN has to play, voting for the leader of their country who determines the national defense, the economy, the well-being of the people, and the nation's position in the world). The tour guide said the woman in government who's currently in charge of immigration "hates immigrants", even tho she's one, so she's forced deportation of "asylum seekers" & immigrants. I'd be willing to bet she's conservative. The tour guide talked about what he said was a terrible policy that Margaret Thatcher had put in place, and called Thatcher "an evil witch". What political party was Margaret Thatcher? Conservative. The tour guide made exactly zero critical comments about liberal government officials, liberal policies and liberal voters. The tour guide, after making a torching accusation against conservative leaders, exclaimed "don't get me wrong I'm not on the far left or anything". Thou doth protest too much. Too late, he'd loudly revealed that he actually is, with his far left monologue for the entire trip. Driving thru Cotswolds he said "I could never live here, too conservative. This is your conservative voting district". Whether left or right, no one wants to hear a torching political commentary when they're on a tour trying to enjoy a day out. In addition to the running political monologue, he made other inappropriate and offensive comments throughout the day. The tour guide repeatedly exclaimed, when talking in a derogatory manner about something, "Jesus Christ!" as an expletive. This is extremely offensive to Christians. He also made several other extremely inappropriate and offensive comments during the tour, such as referring to the poor gentleman who missed our tour bus as "a vegetable". (The gentleman and his wife had missed our tour bus, and later connected up with us). We were on vacation, wanting to enjoy a lovely day out in one of the most beautiful areas in England. The number one reason we visited England. The last thing we wanted was to be subjected to a scathing, ongoing political lambasting. That, coupled with the endless driving between distant Cotswolds villages, and failure to allow us to spend a good amount of leisurely time exploring a quintessential village or two, and turning us loose with no map and no explanation as to what to see in Oxford, ruined the most important part of our vacation. I'll close with a comment to make it clear, the driver was excellent. He was silent during the entire trip and took all directions as to where to go, from the tour guide. The driver did a very good job driving. He had nothing to do with our poor experience.
This was such a lovely day exploring the cotswolds and Oxford. Some how I lucked out on it being a solo tour. I was so appreciative of that the vendor didn’t cancel and also informed me of this. My guide, Tony was so knowledgeable and really catered the tour to my interests. The lunch was great and at a lovely little inn. Thank you so much for a great day!
