Have you considered Burford?

I've never stayed there, but have stopped for lunch and shopping in Tetbury a number of times, and thought I'd like a stay a few days.

it's very close to the wonderful Westonbirt Arboretum: http://www.forestry.gov.uk/westonbirt

"we never seemed to experience the hoards of tourists that are so often mentioned"

That's because they're practically a myth invented by lazy commentators on forums like this. Except in a few very small villages (Bourton on the Water's a particular offended) between 1100 and 1600 on fine weekends and Bank Holidays between Lady Day and Michaelmas those crowds just don't exist.

I totally agree with Anne about Tetbury. It's a proper market town, so it feels bustling pretty much all year round. But that' what the major microtowns like Painswick, Burford, Winchcombe, and Chipping Campden are meant to feel like: the Cotswolds towns work because they're viable economic entities - and most of that bustle doesn't come from tourists. Those wonderful churches were built on the money real merchants made from real businesses - and you can't have real businesses without lots of people.

Less sold on Wetonbirt in midsummer. It's a fascinating arboretum, especially when the acers turn in early autumn. But in midsummer, there's an awful lot else to see all over the place.

Tetbury to Lacock's about 20 miles. Does it matter whether it's in the AONB?

I'm now living (and househunting)in Painswick. I'll help if I can.

Bibury would be maybe 30-35 minutes drive. Castle Combe about 40 minutes drive. Painswick is right on the Cotswold Way, and there are some wonderful walks through the beautiful Slad and Painswick valleys.

Tetbury is nice too, and closer to Castle Coombe and Lacock, but either Tetbury or Painswick would make a good base. Tetbury has moe of a town feel, with quite a lot of shops, antique shops in particular, cafes and pubs whereas Painswick is much quieter and more 'village-ey' with little cottages clustered on narrow lanes.

I have often stopped here for a coffee or bar snack and have always liked its atmosphere :

http://snooty-fox.co.uk/

I've never stayed but it gets good reviews on TA [for what that's worth]

Thank you, all, for your comments. I will research Tetbury.

Flanner, yes I mentioned in my trip report that those hordes of tourists were simply never there. And that includes Bourton on the water. We found the entire area to be very peaceful, and quiet. My query about Lacock is due to the fact that its mentioned in half the guidebooks as a Cotswold village, and not mentioned in others. Just curious about its designation. In photos it looks different than the others, and I think I've read that its a National Trust property.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the area wont be as wet as our visit ladt year. In 2011 we were perhaps a bit spoiled because we seemed to have perfect weather, but last year in Suffolk, Sussex and Dorset I'm not kidding when I say that it rained every day, all day during our visit, and I don't usually mind a little rain, but those areas were incredibly wet. Ha, sorry, I realize I'm sounding like a whiner!
Thanks again!

AV - we had a similar visit to Austria a few years ago. it gave us a rather jaundiced view of what I'm sure is actually a lovely place.

I'm glad that all your visits to Bourton have been quiet - i had an aunty in a retirement home there, and my recollection is that whenever we went to visit her, it was heaving with tourists, but I suppose that we might always have been visiting on Bank Holidays.

The distinctive buildings in the Cotswolds are built in a creamy-coloured oolitic limestone. The geology extends down to the coast in Dorset and up through the East Midlands, so you find the same appearance elsewhere, but not the distinctive steep Cotswold valleys. Lacock is right on the edge of that geology, but places like Bradford on Avon, near Bath, are quite Cotswoldish.

Other attractive, and less touristy places, are Cirencester, Malmesbury and Fairford. Cirencester has a good museum, and you should visit the Roman Villa at Chedworth.

Ann has suggested The Snooty Fox at Tetbury, but you may also consider The Hare & Hounds near Westonbirt. It is just south of Tetbury and close to Highgrove, home of Charles & Camilla. It is also close to Westonbirt Arboretum and to the Beaufort Polo Club, whose website at http://www.beaufortpoloclub.co.uk lists local accommodation.

The generally accepted current definition of the Cotswold boundaries is the AONB, which is mapped at http://maps.cotswoldsaonb.com/#. The current area designated has expanded over the area's 50 year history, but still doesn't include Lacock.

Personally, I think it's disqualified because its church is the wrong stone (my memory is a mass of grey), and its terrain is too flat.The Cotswolds aren't all steep valleys (much of the northern bit is quite gentle) but a Cotswold field has to undulate a fair bit.

And while there's been a bit of unorthodox architecture and some downright heretical cladding over the past 1,000 years (house a couple of doors down plonked stucco over itself in the mid-18th century and the neighbourhood still hasn't recovered from the shock), I think I'm right in saying every single medieval church in the area is built of the proper honey-coloured limestone.

My own mental map of the Cotswolds goes farther to the southeast than the AONB map which flanneruk usefully cites and much less far to the southwest. My mental map is based on where we might go for a Sunday afternoon drive in the halcyon days of 1956 before the Suez War brought back petrol rationing.

Certainly we never thought of the Cotswolds extending to the outskirts of Bristol and we were quite willing to admit places like Lechlade and Faringdon as far as, say, Great Coxwell. By the time you get to the Vale of the White Horse, you are into mostly brick construction and the Downs. Nothing wrong with that, but distant.

These areas are very scenic if only fringes of the official Cotswolds. The absolute core of my own Cotswolds is the valley of the Windrush between the Witney Blanket Mill and Burford because this was accessible to me on a bicycle by myself, and except for being a lot more prosperous now than then, it hasn't changed a great deal.

Ackislander - surely Chipping Sodbury is as much of a Cotswold market town as is Stow on the Wold? Similarly, Wootton under Edge.

No doubt, but it was not on my own age 12 mental map.

For reasons known only to my father, we never went southwest of, say, Circencester unless we were on a Trip or a Holiday or an Expedition of some sort. Serious business with sandwiches and drinks.

In the summer when the days were endless, we usually went north up the Fosse Way, then to attractions on either side (we loved Stratford and Kenilworth and the Rollright Stones). In fall, it was often the Chedworth and the Valley of Coln and Lechlade and Fairford.

Thanks for the replies. I just looked up Bradford on Avon and it looks like a beautiful town to visit(maybe we can drive over from Bath during our stay there).
Last year, in Dorset, we discovered a very enchanting town that made me think of The Cotswolds. It was called Sherborne, and we were blown away by its beauty! We had driven up to Shaftesbury from a hamlet called Plush(where we were staying), spent some time envisioning the Ridley Scott commercial(hovis), and then drove around aimlessly and ended up in Sherborne and WOW, Stunning place. We only had time to walk around for 90 minutes---and I wish we'd have have planned a proper visit.
2 years ago I relied more on my GPS in The Cotswolds . This Summer we plan on driving around the country roads of The Cotswolds and purposefully getting lost, finding hidden treasures along the way.

Still tring to plan this trip. We are thinking 5 days in Cornwall, 4 days in north Devon, then onto Bath again for 2 nights and then The Cotswolds. But I'm wondering about Somerset in the interim---- been reading about Selworthy, quantocks, Cheddar Gorge, etc. Should I add 3 or 4 days and explore there as well?

Thanks again, I never know how to repay everyone for their time. No one seems to come to Cincinnati! I can always help with question about The Netherlands and Belgium, though.

Sorry for typos--- rushing on iPad,

Sherborne is another town on the Jurassic limestone which runs south-west to north-east up England. To the east, the landscape changes to chalk downs, and although there is some building stone available (the greensand), most of the houses are built of brick. The building materials are different again to the west of the limestone ridge.

One of the delights of England is that the geology, and so the building materials, can be very local and can change over a very short distance. In the United States, you can go hundreds of miles without seeing any change in the landscape, dramatic though it may be.

Chartley, I agree. We noticed most of The Suffolk towns were half timbered(some pink), and we observed that the Chilterns villages had their own distinctive look as well(and beautiful people---still don't understand that part).

Here in the US, there's not much difference between one mini mall to the next...

AV - we stayed in Wells for a few days last year and can thoroughly recommend it as a centre for exploring the Cheddar/Glastonbury area.

I think that to do Cornwall justice you would need 6 nights - 3 in the east, and 3 in the west.

Annhig, you're probably right. I'm thinking of foregoing alsace and flying into London instead, spending first day there, and then renting car, driving to Wells for a couple days, then the long drive down to Cornwall. Would you do it this way? (We always end our England trips with a few days in London). Brief London, Wells, Cornwall, Devon, Bath, Cotswolds, Chester, London, home. About 24 days total.

Or would you take that second day out of London and just drive straight down to Cornwall, saving Wells for the drive back up to Bath? Long drives do not bother me one bit.

"Here in the US, there's not much difference between one mini mall to the next."

As there isn't in Britain either.

Restrict your travelling to the planning-controlled parts of a town, and public opinion, mediated through local planning departments, dictates just about everything that's visible (including the colours external woodwork can be painted).

Drive a mile out to the new Tesco and it'll look like 300 other Tescos around the country, and you'll likely drive past suburbs interchangeable with anywhere else as well.

Ackislander's trips from Witney (not in the Cotswolds) probably started in the tightly controlled conservation area in the centre of town, hit the hideous 1950s new builds only a few hundred yards out, stayed just as hideous for the four miles or so along Burford Rd that lacked the centre's planning constraints and were (and remain) lined with tacky warehouses, then got back to compulsory oolite limestone the moment he passed the Burford town limit sign.

Without the tyranny of planning regs, England would be as horrible as most of Italy or France. Possibly even as bad as Ireland.

Flanner, we did see some of what you mentioned( but not in the Cotswolds). Last year, the Chilterns was a lovely area, but we did notice that it was kind of interspersed with some suburban sprawl-- here and there. I remember driving through Reading( I think think this was the town) and we commented on how boring and somewhat American parts of it were, however, as a whole, your country doesn't come close to blighting the landscape in the way our development has scarred so many MANY parts of the US. We also saw some of this in France last year.
Holland had changed considerably since the 90s, although everything seemed very well maintained and unified.

I was lucky, flanneruk.

None of that had been built when I lived in Witney. The whole area in the middle of the town where the courts and parking are now was allotments. No shopping centers, no highway through passing through and raping Ducklington, the Burford Road was the A40, no warehouses, nothing but fields from the garage at the top of Tower Hill all the way to Burford.

My Cotswolds began at Minster Lovell, which I could and did bike to regularly.

My home in America, Nantucket Island, is in a place with extremely strong planning constraints, and I support them wholeheartedly. Would that they were more widespread.