Your guide to a day in Oxford

After a month of living in London, I decided it was time to venture outside of the city! It was the last day of September and you could feel the changes happening. The air was crisp, the leaves were crunching under my feet & I was absolutely living for it. 🍂 Fall is my favorite season if you couldn’t tell.

This was also my last free week before classes started and I wanted to take advantage of the free time, so off we went. My friend Cassidy and I decided on Oxford because it’s a short journey outside the city, easily walkable to & from the station, and as a Harry Potter fan I wanted to see some filming sites. 🤓 We went on a Wednesday, which I think that was the move! There were no crowds, the weather was perfect, and lots of places had student discounts or weekday happy hour deals. Obviously you need to check on the websites of all the sites though, because some may have closures. For example, our Christ Church tour we didn’t get to see the Cathedral, and other days the great hall was closed. Just do a little prep work and you’ll be good to go!

I’m gonna walk you through what we did, and then at the end I’ll have a mock itinerary that can help you plan your own day trip to Oxford!

Our day in Oxford 

So Cassidy and I are opposite sides of London (SW v East), which meant the best place for us to take a train out of the city was Paddington. From Paddington to Oxford, you can get direct trains riding under an hour for less than £15, you will just need to be willing to leave early and book in advance. We used the website thetrainline.com to book our tickets ahead for the way there, but not for the way back which in hindsight was nice for flexibility exploring but not for our wallets. Definitely try to book both your trains in advance; worst case you can just come back if you didn’t fit everything in. 😉

We arrived in Oxford at about 9:30am to a strange sound…silence. Coming from bustling London, it was odd to have such a quite and peaceful city not yet coming to life. We were both a bit tired from the early start, so we grabbed coffees and crepes at this cute little café called Art Cafe Oxford. We didn’t have our first activity booked until 11:30, so we took advantage of the time to explore and get our bearings of the town. 

Fueling up for our full day of exploring Oxford!

The town is actually very easy to walk, with everything being quite accessible. As you walk into town, the first thing we went to check out was the covered market. The market gave me upscale pike place in Philly vibes, with lots of variety in their booths. Our favorite shop was a quirky store with items playing on the dirty town names in England. Tea towels, t-shirts, you name it. I mean can you believe there is an actual town in England called Rotten Bottom?? 😅

Some other areas we went to check out in the morning it were the Bridge of Sighs, Radcliffe camera, and Bohleim library. Being there before 10 AM, we had no crowds and they were great spots to take photos!

Our first tour that we booked was at the Oxford castle and prison. The tour lasted just over an hour, cost £14 and had an in person tour guide who told us how the tower was used as a prison as well as some of the greatest prisoners who were housed there or how people escaped. Most fascinating to me was that the prison had still been operating up until 1996! The other half of the prison was actually converted into a swanky hotel which you can now stay in starting at £170 a night.

The part of the Oxford prison that was converted into the Malmaison hotel. Could make for a fun Halloween trip!

After that tour, I’m honestly surprised we had an appetite lol. We ended up eating lunch at the Ivy, which is a chain here in England that has amazing inside interiors and delicious food and drinks to match the vibes! If you don’t feel like going to a chain, I listed some other ideas below in the mock itinerary.

By the time we finished lunch, it was onto our next tour at Christ Church. Fun fact: Oxford University is actually made up of over 30 different colleges. Christ Church is just one of those, but probably the most prominently recognized. The tour includes a self-guided multimedia tour and access to most of the grounds for £15. Like I mentioned, the cathedral was closed on the day we came to visit, but we still spent over an hour & a half doing the tour, taking photos, and walking the grounds so give yourself plenty of time for this one. Masks are still required at this time.

And of course, visiting Christ Church was especially exciting for me as I am a big Harry Potter fan and there are many sites which were filmed or inspired by for the Harry Potter films! Had to geek out just a bit pretending I was at Hogwarts. 🤓⚡️

The grounds were just stunning, and we were lucky enough that even though the cathedral was closed we could hear the choir practicing from out on the quad. Just around the corner from the college you can reach the Botanic Gardens if you wanted to explore more of the greenery around the University.

At this point, it was rounding close to 4 PM and my feet were screaming at me for wearing heeled boots all day. Oops! We walked back down towards city center stopping in a couple of Harry Potter themed shops and the Oxford bookstore before making our way to the Kings arms for a G&T and to rest our feet.

Refreshed from our Gin & Tonics, we decided down on dinner at the White Rabbit for a slice of pizza before heading back to the a train station. They had throwback music where we were all singing along and it was packed for a Wednesday evening! Plus you can get a whole pizza for just £14. Of course, as I mentioned earlier we didn’t book our home train tickets yet so we had an unpleasant shock to see a jump in prices (still not too horrible though at £28). As the sun set on our day in Oxford, we boarded the train and finally made our way back home to London.

So there you have it, my first day trip outside of London! Below is a quick guide to help you map out your own trip. Enjoy! 😊

Potential schedule 

8am catch train from Paddington arrive by 9:30

• Grab coffee & breakfast

• Walk to some sites like the bridge of sighs, Radcliff camera, and the covered market

11:30 Oxford castle & prison tour (1 hr, £14)

12:45 lunch (See list)

2:30 Christ church tour (1.5 hours, £15)

• Botanic Gardens And Arboretum

• Walk back towards the bridge of Sighs and stop along all the fun shops like Shop of Secrets and the book store

5pm Happy Hour 

6:30pm Dinner

8pm train back to Paddington, arrive in London by 9pm

Places to Eat & Drink:

• The Kings Arms: G&T Royale

• White Rabbit - best pizza & fun vibes!

• The Ivy- (2 course for £16.95)

• Thirsty Meeples (boardgames)

• G&D’s ice cream café

• Kazbar: Spanish tapas

• The Alice

• Pompette

• Old Parsonage

• The Magdalene arms

• The missing bean: coffee shop

• Yellow Submarine

• The vaults and garden Café

• Turf Tavern

Other things to do:

• Afternoon tea at The grande café or the Rose

• Jericho neighborhood

• Pitt Rivers museum

• Punt on the river

• Blenheim palace

• Alice’s shop

• Harry Potter film locations tour

• Broughton Castle

• Bodleian Library

• Haunted Oxford Tour

• Stay at Malmaison Hotel

Until next week! x

Sincerely,

Sarah

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