Nope -- very VERY unlikely any of that could fall into place. (Coach tours don't start out at 5PM -they more often are ending around then)

Your only hope is to hire a driver - guide for the day. But even w/ that it would be next to impossible. Warwick and Oxford alone is a very full day's worth.

Especially not starting til 10AM.

The Cotswold villages/towns you want to see are spread over a very wide area and even just them would be a full day.

Your expectations are unrealistic.

you have 3 separate days here -

Warwick Castle and Warwick, [you could add Kenilworth to this if you wanted more to do]

Cotswold villages, and

Oxford.


you have to get there, get parked, walk, eat, etc. etc.

I agree those are three separate day trips but if you are really motivated you could do Warwick and Oxford on one very long day. You'd miss out on a lot in each but you could have a reasonably enjoyable day if you like long days.

IMHO more like 4 days -

1 Oxford
1 Warwick and environs
2 in the Cotswolds - you are looking at a lot of villages not near each other

Also,, I think the Cotswolds part can be done only be car - either you rent to get a drive

(And yes, I have been to all of these places. You have no idea how long it takes to get from one village to another on very small, narrow local roads.)

I am in total agreement with nytraveler. I lived in the area as a child and have revisited over the years.

Oxford is a lot bigger than what you see in Inspector Lewis.

Warwick is near enough to Stratford that if you have any interest in Shakespeare at all, you should go to both. And Kenilworth.

The little villages and small towns of the Cotswolds are infinitely charming and often linked by one lane roads (say Burford to Minster Lovell, for example). You will need a car or a driver.

It would also be wacko -- no offense -- to try to do these as day trips from London. Oxford, not a problem, but if you want to visit all three, you should locate in a central point and do them as day trips from there.

Thank you for all your responses. I don't have those extra days to do all those tours, so I guess that is what I can do on my next trip to the UK. In the meantime I think i am more incline to start as early as possible in Oxford 8:00am try to do a walking tour and take a half day tour to the cotswolds from there. Will that be more realistic? Do any of you know a company that provides half day tours from oxford to the cotswolds? thanks again for taking the time to respond. I greatly appreciated.

Try Cotswold Roaming for half day tours. www.cotswold-roaming.co.uk

Absolute Touring is another option, but I think they only do full day tours.

www.absolutetouring.co.uk

I know a great independent tour guide based in Stratford who I'm sure could put together a good day to capture the best of the area. They are Rita Mansfield Associates. I don't have contact details to hand but a google search should do the job. Worth talking to them before you move too far away from your original plan. I live close to Warwick and think you could do a quick tour of Warwick Castle drive through a bit of the Cotswolds and be in Oxford by mid afternoon where you are more likely to have time to do aft and eve tours.

"think you could do a quick tour of Warwick Castle"

A quick tour of Warwick Castle isn't really all that doable. Heck - it can take 10+ minutes just walking from/to the car park. then five more minutes each way from the ticket kiosk to the Castle. . . . So one has invested 30-ish minutes w/o even stepping inside the castle. Even a cursory visit (without exploring the gardens) will take at least 2 hours.

moenialey: ". . . early as possible in Oxford 8:00am try to do a walking tour "

There are no tours nearly that early - the first tour is @ 10:45 and the rest are in the afternoon.

Even if cheryl's friend is a miracle guide, Warwick, Oxford and the towns you want to visit are not a doable day trip.

Snowshill BTW is a 10-15 minute walk up from the car park and the house/gardens easily would take 90 minutes absolute minimum . . . and they do timed tickets so one doesn't just arrive and walk up the hill and into the house.

Oxford to Castle Combe is a looong way - nearly a two hour drive w/o any stops/detours. And Warwick to Castle Combe takes even longer.

No matter what you want to see, you only have one day from London so you should pick Oxford or the Cotswolds or Warwick -- OR -- Take an expensive commercial coach tour starting from London and get a small glimpse of each place. (But it won't include any of the Cotswold villages/towns listed)

I'm afraid you just need a bit of a reality check . . .

I found an Oxford/Cotswolds/Stratford day tour from London offered by International Friends. It's about the only Cotswolds guided tour that I could find for the middle of March, 2013. Their tours are limited to 16 people and they use a small tour bus that (supposedly) gets to areas the bigger tour buses can't.
http://www.internationalfriends.co.uk/

If you want to start a trip to Oxford at a sensible time, there's nothing at all stopping you from an 8 am tour. You just have to do it yourself.

Get the 0630 or 0700 weekday trains from Paddington, which arrive an hour later. If you can't find a self-guided tour that suits easily from http://www.visitoxfordandoxfordshire.com/see-and-do/, or from http://www.ox.ac.uk/visitors_friends/visiting_the_university/index.html, go, with your smartphone, to the Oxford Explore signpost at the bus stop in the street to the right of the bus area in fron of the station (map at http://www.oxfordexplore.com/en/map/view/4)

Scan the QR code, then walk on to the next Oxford Explore signpost. Or preresearch it by clicking on the orange hotspots at home, then downloading or printing whatever you're interested in. You can see a lot from outside by 1300: admission times into colleges, libraries and museums vary (and you really HAVE to see inside at least one college): college times at http://www.ox.ac.uk/visitors_friends/visiting_the_university/visiting_the_colleges/index.html: museum, library etc times at http://www.ox.ac.uk/visitors_friends/visiting_the_university/visiting_museums_libraries_and_places_of_interest/index.html

The 0700 is often eligible for Advance tickets, though weekday departures before 0930 are usually quite costly. An X90 or Oxford Tube bus leaving central London (lots of departure points: go to their sites to find one that suits you) leaving by 0600 will get you into central Oxford by 0800 a lot more cheaply: leave any later and you're likely to get snarled in Oxford's formidable incoming morning traffic.

No idea about tours from Oxford to the Cotswolds, but others probably will.

I live close to Warwick and think you could do a quick tour of Warwick Castle drive through a bit of the Cotswolds and be in Oxford by mid afternoon where you are more likely to have time to do aft and eve tours.>>

the poster of this info has only ever made the one post, strangely recommending a local travel guide.

say no more.

not only is Warwick Castle a lot to see, but it's pretty expensive. to see everything it's £20 odd for an adult, and that's with the booking on-line discount. you would want your money's worth, i'd have thought.

When are you going to London and how long will you be there? Where else in the UK are you going? Knowing those things we might be able to give you better advice.

Warwick Castle opens at 10 am and it takes about two hours to get there from central London - the train plus getting to the castle from the station. Get there when it opens and spend at least two hours at the castle, then walk into town - it's a beautiful little town, see it and have a bite to eat, then take the train to Oxford. That train takes about an hour. This would get to Oxford by about 2-3pm. Take a couple of tours of the inside of one or two colleges before they close, then do your own walking tour (there are plenty of 'tours' you can put together from the various guidebooks). Hopefully you will be going in spring/summer when it stays light out late.

I realize I like to go slower than the average traveler as I've learned from experienced people here. Still, there's a limit, I know too, to how fast one can fly around these beautiful places and still get a glimmer of their worth. Snowshill is a good example of a place that I believe would be meaningless if not seen at a leisurely pace.

I've offered this opinion here and longer on another forum many times and have come to the conclusion that, while some seem to understand, many never will and will go rushing around to 10 places a day to consider themselves then well traveled when seeing 1 or 2 places well might have given them some insight into someone else's world. I think that's the best thing we can try to convey, whether it's asked or not.

You can go direct from London Marylebone to Warwick station in about 1 hour 25 minutes. You would need to get a cab from the station which would take around 10 minutes max to get to the castle.
It is expensive, so agree with the others you would want to give it more than 30 minutes. And as Isabel said there are other places around that you may want to go and see. ( Stratford is well worth a visit)

Mme Perdu - good point.

"many never will and will go rushing around to 10 places a day to consider themselves then well traveled when seeing 1 or 2 places well might have given them some insight into someone else's world"

Hmm...I wonder.

I wonder how many of us really want "insight into someone else's world" at all, and how many want that everywhere they go.

This particular problem has been raised because the poster won't drive (God knows why: it's one of those prissy American neuroses, but there we are). It's perfectly possible that if they got over that absurd phobia, and were prepared to risk the fines involved in driving through central Oxford's electronic barriers, and parking briefly on double yellow lines, they could actually drive round the places they want to see. More - and here's the thing frequent contributors rarely get they'd probably be perfectly content with what they saw

In fact, re-reading this post, I'd say that's precisely what the poster should do (it really ISN'T life-threatening to drive on a different side of the road. In Britain, we do it practically every time we go on holiday. Which, being morally decadent Europeans, we do all the time)

From time to time, I've tried doing something more or less as frenetic. Sometimes, I've regretted it, sometimes it worked, sometimes I just fell asleep, sometimes I've gone back months or decades later to do tiny bits "properly"

Very rarely, "properly" has meant striving for greater insight into someone else's world - though usually that's involved courses, heavy homework or the coincidence of a trip with my professional or academic expertise. More often, though, "properly" has just meant revisiting something at greater leisure (it's an awful thing to say, but my interest into the world that built Angkor Wat, or the Xian terracotta warriors is remarkably limited - and certainly less than my simple interest in the artefacts themselves).

And, for all sorts of reasons, I've been able to revisit lots of places at other people's expense, and live near enough a huge slug of Western culture to feel happy about devoting a whole morning to a minor New York museum or Florence church.

Most people (especially Americans, with their limited vacation time, and that's clearly even truer of most Chinese and Indians) don't have that luxury. Just seeing what's there is all they want - and that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Everyone here's done a great job of answering the question the poster asked. But I really do wonder if any of us have really tried to help the poster find what he or she was looking for.

Flanner, everthing you say is true, everyone has a right to their own experience in their own way. But as, presumably, people with some insight into the subjects being discussed, why not point out alternatives if we believe there are good ones. I think you do it regularly and some will apply the concepts and some won't. We all know that.

I never used the word "properly", have tried to contribute an alternative to the rushing around and to describe what I like about a slower pace. Many would be bored to death doing as I do. But that shouldn't stop me from commenting. I enjoy your takes on things even when it seems to me you go overboard. It really is the fringe opinions I enjoy most. Not everyone will agree and few will alter plans accordingly. But some will and that's good enough for me to continue offering them.

and to follow on - whether one is happy w/ a quick glimpse as flanner suggests, or wants more of an immersion like MmePerdu describes - One simply cannot manage Warwick Castle, Oxford, Bourton-on-the-water, Bibury, Stanton, Snowshill, and Castle Combe on the same day . . . Just ain't possible.

Sometimes things just are NOT possible. There are not enough hours in the day to get to 8 or 9 different places - even if one is willing to travel well into the night.

Even if one spent four days on this - one is still just getting a superficial view of a bunch of places - can't imagine that anyone is thinking they will learn anything substantial about the people or their way of life. IMHO one needs to stay at least several weeks in one place - if not months - to do so.

We took three days to do what you're suggesting, and we didn't stop in Stanton or Snowshill or try to include Castle Combe. Unless you're willing to give this at least one more day, I don't think it's possible.

You can read my trip report, if you like, to get an idea of how long we took doing the things you want to do. http://www.fodors.com/community/europe/roundabout-the-uk-p-p-the-professor-and-some-p-ob-may-2007.cfm

Lee Ann

I find myself in some agreement with flanneruk.

I don't drive in the UK any more, but if I were going to drive again the country lanes of Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire, and Warwickshire would be amongst the least threatening places to drive.

I would rent locally rather than driving up from London. Most market towns have a garage that will rent a car for a day or two and it really is the only way to see what the OP wants to see. And it still can't be done in the amount of time she wants to spend doing it.

It depends on your experience. If you are used to driving on highways and major two way streets with multiple lanes in each direction - a very narrow, winding road in the countryside can be very intimidating. And if you are used to roads with wide lanes and broad shoulders a very narrow road with ditches in each side can be downright scary if you come up against a vehicle in the opposite direction.

Not sure why the OP doesn't want to drive - but as an American who has driven often in europe - the major roads are perfectly familiar and easy to drive - but very small local roads can make me uncomfortable - since this is simply something we don't have in our area.

In fact, driving one local road we cam around a turn and nearly hit a couple of lambs in the middle of the road. They had somehow squeezed under s fence and we couldn't get past them since they kept jumping around. We tried to herd them back under the fence to their mothers - but they seem to have the IQ of kumquats and just didn't get it. Luckily the farmer came along and his dog chased them back where they belonged. But we spend about 15 minutes trying to figure out how to get down the lane without hitting them.