What would your ideal day in Oxford entail?
 

If you only had a day to explore and not multiple days or weeks, what would be at the top of your priority list?

We (DH and DS-12 and I) have a long list of things we would like to cover but in your opinion how should we prioritize them? We realize we can't see them all in one day so we have to pick and choose on the day. We need help in narrowing down our list.

Here is our wish list:

1.Tour Bodliein Library either standard or extensive tour--which one do you recommend? Son would be allowed in as he is over 11. We had taken an hour tour of the Library of Congress in Washington D. C. which looks like a European palace and loved it. So we are looking forward to seeing this magnificent library too.

2. Take a walking tour given by the tourist information center to admire the architecture.
3. Ashmolean Museum--which section is recommended? Antiquities of Egypt? The coin collection? Something I didn't mention but should definitely see? How long to spend in there to get a nice flavor?
4. Museum of history of science
5. Magdalen College and New College
6. Oxford Botanic Garden if the weather is nice
7. Christ Church picture gallery
8. Christ Church dining Hall--it was just the inspiration for Harry Potter and not the actual film location. We saw the Harry Potter traveling exhibition in the states where the filmmakers recreated the dining hall set and showed off a whole bunch of props and costumes used in the movie. So given that, is it worthwhile to see the Christ Church dining hall or just view another college's dining hall that allows visitors?
9. Covered market--is it worhtwhile to drop in for a visit?
10. Punting along the river?

Obviously we will not see all of this in one day so which would you keep and which to save for another future visit?

FWIW-my brother went to Oxford after grad school, so about 10 years ago, we visited the town on a day trip. Went up the stairs of Bodleian library to go inside, the guard at the door said one had to be a student to gain admission. I pointed out our tale, 'wanting to see where he'd gone to school', and the guard reluctantly let us inside the door 6 feet so we could at least see a bit of the inside. After we had our 60 second look-see, he guided us out again.

I take it you've found a tour that lets you in? Maybe Oxford has realized the commercial benefit of letting hogwarts pay admission?

They do offer tours throughout the day. A standard tour for one hour, a mini tour for 30 minutes and an extensive tour for 90 minutes according to the website. Each with its own price tag of course depending on the duration.

Other than the divinity school though, there is nothing else Hogwarts related at the library that I know about. However, the library itself is a draw strictly by itself without the Harry Potter connection.

Many of the Oxford venues that the average visitor would want to see have a charge connected to them. The library, Christ Church, Botanic Garden etc. The museums and a number of colleges are free though. My question is which ones are definitely worth paying for to visit and which ones are we better off skipping.

1.A walking tour from the TI office. Check and see what is being offered on your date/s. We went on the Inspector Morse one but a "general" one would have been fine; maybe there's a special interest one you'd like. (You'll probably go by all the "major" sights on any of them, including maybe even the Covered Market for a peek. Such a tour will show you what to go back to, too.)

2.Magdalen College. Check hours of operations to make sure you can go in. Colleges usually aren't open for visitors until after noon, and there are certain days they might not be. Be sure to walk along Addison's Walk at least a little.

3.University Church of St. Mary the Virgin--climb the tower. Finally did it on my 4th trip and wow, what a view!

(3a.)The Eagle and the Child pub if you are at all interested in Lewis/Tolkien.

4. Maybe the Ashmolean. Very nice; finally made it in on our 3rd visit.

5. Maybe the Bodleian. (Haven't been on the tour you're looking at, though.)

(Our other favorite things were right outside of Oxford--C.S. Lewis's grave at Holy Trinity Church in Headington and The Kilns and J.R.R. Tolkien's grave--but these sites can't be walked to. We also loved going in Blackwells Books in Oxford.)

"Christ Church dining Hall--it was just the inspiration for Harry Potter and not the actual film location.

Have you accidentally mistyped? I've no idea what bits of the Potter films were filmed where, but it's certainly not true that the books were "inspired" by Ch Ch dining hall. England's got hundreds of collegiate-style dining halls, dozens of them pre-1600 and - apart from having slightly more interesting pictures on its walls - Ch Ch is virtually indistinguishable from the 30-odd other dining halls in Oxford.

Having read your strange comment, I've now spent a whole 5 mins googling it, and realise there's a weird internet myth sprung up about this. But, outside the purple prose of tenth-rate travelguides, there's not a scrap of evidence to support it.

As far as your other questions are concerned: why ask us? If you've seen a covered city centre market, Oxford's is unexceptional. If you're uninterested in botanical gardens, there's no reason to expect Oxford's to be worth wasting time on. Only you know what you're interested in.

The Ashmolean is tricky. It's extraordinarily densely packed, covers a huge spectrum of interesting things, is a model of modern museumology but has nothing that spectacularly stands out as the sort of silly "must see" people waste their time on (except possibly the Alfred jewel, and maybe for Americans the cloak of Pocohontas' father). Look at the museum floor plan on its site and decide which subjects interest you. If none of them do, there's no law saying you have to visit the place

Christ Church picture gallery is of little interest to anyone except people interested in its specialities. The Museum of the History of Science is fascinating if you love 17th and 18th century scientific objects, or have an interest in the history of science. It gets relatively few visitors. The second most visited museum in Oxford, BTW, is the University Museum of Natural History, whose stuffed dodo is responsible for the phrase "dead as a dodo", whose major dinosaur was the first anywhere to be identified (and whose identifier is himself a fascinating character for any 11 yo to learn about), which was the location (partly because of the dodo and the dinosaur) of the great evolution debates in the mid-19th century that transformed the English scientific and religious cultures and which is manifestly more enjoyed on wet Sunday afternoons by children than any other Oxford "attraction"

Technology now makes a repeat of tomboy's story impossible: access to the Bodleian's interior requires a smartcard. Both the standard tour and the mini tours (http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/bodley/...ndividual/mini) include Duke Humfrey's Library, so you get to see at least some books (the tour seems to be heavier on architecture than librarianship, though I've never been on it). I'd question the value of the extra time and expense for the extended tour if you're not a library freak: the key extra is getting inside the Radcliffe Camera - in my view, to discover it's a lot prettier from the outside. You can usually get the same effect for free in the Old Reading Room at the British Museum in London.

Tour of the Bod, pop into Worcester, lunch in or near Little Trendy street, across to Magdalen rose garden and by the river there, check out Magdalen proper and see if you can go evening punting so that you can go up to the Pub beyond the parks (and the ring road) and then cruise back past Addisons walk in the late evening with only the bats and stars to bother you.

My London friends took me there last year. They had never taken the city tour on the double decker bus. It was fantastic and we all enjoyed it immensely. It was about 90 minutes and obviously gives you a bird's eye view of Oxford. I think this is a good way to start your visit and then you can go to the particular places you want to see. We went to the Ashmolean and enjoyed it. Had lunch/wine at the All Bar One restaurant and although it's a local chain, it was quite good. Recommend it.

Opinions differ on this, but I'd absolutely recommend NOT to use the HOHO bus.

Most of the nicest parts of Oxford can't be accessed by buses at all, so the HOHO takes you mostly round its 19th century suburbs. As the previous poster implies, you can then get a wholly distorted view of the city, and in a day's trip there's a real risk of revisiting the least interesting places of all.

Strongly argue you start with a walking tour as you intended to, and with the Bodleian tour (which is what the incomprehensible Bilbo meant.) You're then having to juggle the remaining 6 hrs or so - and that's too short to waste in a modern pub belonging to a national chain.

Worcester College is well worth visiting (apart from anything else it's free and has a glorious garden). But it's open only between 2 pm and 5 pm

flanneruk--to answer your question, I did not mean that the book Harry Potter was inspired by Christ Church. However, I did read and we were told during our Harry Potter exhibition tour that the scenes of Hogwarts dining hall were inspired by the dining hall of Christ Church. At the exhibition they recreated the dining hall set that was used in the filming of the movie.

We are sort of library freaks. We frequent our local library system quite frequently. We loved the Library of Congress tour in Washington D.C., and we really enjoyed the Vancouver library too with its modern architecture. We didn't get a chance to see the British Library in London on our last trip. That will have to wait for another visit.

What are the best (best in terms of architecture and beauty) free colleges that are open to visitors?

Sounds like Magdalen which I believe there is a fee is one definitely to explore in the afternoon, if open at the time of our visit.

If you have an interest in music I suggest you visit Christ Church Cathedral for an evensong service (usually 6pm, free) and experience another dimension of this beautiful building:

http://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/cathedral
http://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/cathedral/choir
http://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/cathedral/service-times

I believe there are other churches with choir services too but this is the one I go to.

to clarify some of the confusion on this thread...Christ Church dining call was inspired by the vivid descriptions of the hogwarts dining hall in the classic harry potter books. literature can be influential on architecture and this is a great example.

When are you intending to go?

I don't think I've ever been to Oxford (and I have a number of times) without going punting. In summer, of course. Punt up to the Victoria Arms is always fun.

We intend to go in the summer so punting may be an option.

Texasbookworm--thanks for the info on University Church of St Mary the Virgin. What did you enjoy most about the Ashmolean--which section?

For anyone visiting the states who is interested in dinosaurs, there is a very impressive dinosaur collection at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. It has the largest collection of Jurassic dinosaurs.

From their website they describe the exhibit as follows, "Dinosaurs in Their Time is the first permanent exhibition in the world to feature scientifically accurate, immersive environments spanning the Mesozoic Era—the Age of Dinosaurs—arranged chronologically and filled with actively posed original fossil specimens. See dinosaurs like they haven’t been seen in 66 million years!....In the century since the discovery of Diplodocus carnegii, scientific interpretations of dinosaurs and their lives have changed remarkably. Dinosaurs in Their Time is a dramatic exhibit arena that reflects current scientific evidence of these colossal creatures and their environments. For instance, we now know that Diplodocus did not drag its tail through Jurassic swamps, and the sheer size of Tyrannosaurus rex casts a shadow of doubt on its reputation as a Cretaceous killing machine. The continental and climatic changes that affected the evolution of species over time are also addressed as well as the other extraordinary life forms that shared their environment, including birds, fish, amphibians, turtles, plants, and even mammals. The museum's vast fossil collections, combined with its scientific expertise, guarantee an exhibition that accurately interprets the incredible record prehistoric animals left behind and integrates the dinosaurs into the ancient ecosystems in which they lived."

It was a remarkable exhibit.

We barely made it into the Ashmolean for an hour. I rather liked the building itself, with light streaming in, more than I remember any specific section.

How are you getting there? Do you have all day?

Always listen to flanneruk who says "Strongly argue you start with a walking tour as you intended to, and with the Bodleian tour." He knows Oxford. (If by the following--"You're then having to juggle the remaining 6 hrs or so - and that's too short to waste in a modern pub belonging to a national chain."--he meant the Eagle and the Child, I'd say it depends on why you would go to such a pub. The food etc. is passable but not the reason for going--it was because of the Inkling connection we went, so it was way up high on my list and on the lists of every other group of companions, but you might not care. Wouldn't suggest it for a food/pub destination alone!)

We actually took your advice Texasbookworm and we are staying at a B&B in Headington. We were getting very high quotes to stay in city centre and thought the quick bus ride from Headington sounds doable at a much more reasonable price. Did you eat anything decent in the area?

So we will have a full day and evening to explore Oxford but the next morning we would move along to our next stop.

We definitely have high on our list the walking tour as FlannerUK suggests. We want to admire the architecture.

We do want to visit the Bodleian library but just not sure which tour to take. FlannerUK suggests the extensive tour may be a bit too much considering we are short on time. So either the mini or the standard sounds about right.

Then we are trying to decide which of the many museums we should spend some time. Son does like dinosaurs but we have seen the dinsaur fossil collections at the Carnegie Museum, the Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C. and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. The three museums together make up the three largest dinosaur collections in the U.S. Plus we saw T rex Sue at the Field Museum in Chicago. So we had our full of dinosaurs! Not to mention each of the museums impressive rock and mineral collections as well.

For Oxford we would like to see something unique. The Bates Museum of musical instruments sounds interesting but they are only open during term time and have limited hours. I don't think it will be open when we are there.

Is the Pitts River Museum geared to little kids? Or does it offer an array of things for all ages?

Regarding food, it doesn't appear there are any recommended places in and around Oxford for decent cuisine. Are there?

OXFORD is unique. Just wandering around the different colleges is unique. If you take a couple tours, go inside a college like Magdalen, go up the tower at University Church, wander around a little, maybe pop into the Ashmolean, (not in that order) that could probably take up just about your whole long day.

We did not eat in Headington.

Quite true! That is the very reason we want to visit--to see the unique University. I guess I shouldn't focus on which museum to visit since we should just concentrate on wandering around after the tours and seeing which colleges are open for visitors at the time.

Sometimes you see a big list of things to do and see and want to cover it all, but can't especially if you only allow yourself one day.

Which of the colleges is everyone's favorite?

Per their website, University Church is currently under scaffolding for major work/repairs during this year 2012 so not sure how many months that will take to finish.

hmmm, I had a nice conversation in June 2011 with a gentleman on the church's tower as he, an engineer, was measuring things in preparation for some repairs but I didn't realize there would be closures; bummer if you can't get up there. Plenty else to see! (I vote for Magdalen--gorgeous. Each College is lovely and if you look at lists of alum, you could be pick one for literary/historical connections if you want.)

As you seem to love books, don't discount popping in bookstores, too, like Blackwells.

Parts of the Pitt Rivers Museum are a little ghoulish (shrunken heads, ritual and magic objects), but if your child can handle that, it is fascinating-- organized according to the subjects the collectors were interested in (i.e., there's a big section on tattooing and another on opium pipes, if I remember right). What I liked most about it was its old-fashionedness; the labels were in the faded handwriting of the collectors, and everything is jammed in, over the top, canoes hanging from the ceiling. I was expecting the Ashmolean to be that way, and most of it had been tidied up.

I think Pitt Rivers is in the same building as the dodo, so you could do both.

Thanks, everyone. Maybe we can pop in to see the dodo and have a visit at Pitt Rivers. All depends on how the day goes and what is open as far as colleges and specific walking tour times. Blackwells sounds interesting too.

As far as punting if the weather cooperates, is the location by the Magdalen bridge?

Have you picked out a walking tour from the TI office yet? Look at their website and pick a tour (we pre-ordered tickets, too, and picked them up at the TI office); that might help you plan your day. (Maybe you already did this) I would assume the Library tour is at a specific time, too, so those two tour times might dictate a lot about your day. (I have NOT looked at every College website, but I think generally they aren't open to the public until after noon at the earliest, on the days they are open. I had excellent response via email from the colleges I contacted about definite dates and times of opening.)

If you walk north to the Parks and then stroll across to the river you will find a small boat house with punts which I "think" are available to the general public (anyone else know? I've never used them so they could be a college punt store). If they are; the punt up the Cherwell (not the Isis, which is what the Thames is called in Oxford) to the Pub is relatively easy. If you go South however you get the chance to punt past various colleges, a punt slide (oh the fun you can have in that) and even a little white water punting where the canalised upper Cherwell gushes out onto the lower Cherwell

There are rentable punts under Magdalen bridge and others (ownership not known to this guy) a the bridge over the Isis upsream of Christchurch

Though you can rent punts elsewhere, I've only ever gone to the Cherwell Boathouse http://www.cherwellboathouse.co.uk/

Not entirely sure why I always go back to the same place. Habit probably - plus the restaurant which has been very good the couple of times I've eaten there.

janisj, that's the place on the parks

My advice would be: Have a plan "B". My grandmother and I spent two days in Oxford in May 2011, though the jet-lagged arrival day was spent at Blenheim Palace and Woodstock mostly. The 2nd day was devoted entirely to Oxford and my plan was as follows:

Explore Oxford/Walk around looking at all the fabulous architecture
Christ Church College - Self Guided Tour
Climb Anglo Saxon Tower at St. Michael at the North Gate church
Lunch
Bohdleian Library ( Exhibit on 500 years of King James Bible )
Explore Oxford some more, making our way to Magdalen College (C. S. Lewis)
Tour Magdalen College
Have dinner at Eagle and Child pub (Inklings: C. S. Lewis/J. R. R. Tolkien)

It all went according to plan apart from Magdalen Collenge, which was closed that day for a private function. There was no way on earth that this could be anticipated in advance! Unfortunately I didn't know any of the other colleges were open at that hour (4pm onwards) to tour around, Magdalen was supposedly open 2pm-6pm. So in the end we walked around and looked at Merton College from the door (Tolkien) and made our way to Queen St. There we shopped for a while before heading back to the Eagle and Child for a fish n chip dinner. A very full, satisfying day but a backup plan would have been helpful regarding Magdalen:/.

Hope you have a wonderful day in Oxford!

No, I haven't pre-booked a public tour yet. I had thought the dates were too far out in the future, but now I see they have dates posted for the summer. We are interested in the regular university tour either at 10:45 or 13:00.

For the Bodleian, the only tour you can pre-book is for the extended tour at 9:15 otherwise it is first come first serve on the day. So still undecided on what to do here.

Thanks for the link on punting.

As far as visiting colleges and museums we have to see what we are up to that day and what is open. Thanks Irishwhislter90 too. We will have a list of potential colleges, and check their websites prior to see if they are closed for a private party or open to visitors for that day.

Thanks again, all!