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We travel across the Chiltern Hills to Oxford, The City of Dreaming Spires - famous the world over for its University and place in history. Pinnacled towers and cloistered college lawns, bicycles propped against honey-stone walls and punts on the willow-fringed River Cherwell are all symbols of this venerable city whose heart still beats to its own timeless rhythms. Saxon ox drivers were the first to settle here, around a ford of the Thames that flows south of the city ('Oxen-ford'). The university itself dates from the 13th century when the first colleges were founded - University College, Balliol and Merton. Today there are 39 colleges, each with its own character and traditions.
After a short orientation drive around the City, we'll park outside the college where Tony Blair was a scholar. I'll take you for a leisurely walking tour around the City centre taking in Oxford's most famous sites and tucked-away treasures in the lanes and alleyways in between. We'll explore different aspects of the history and architecture of both the city and the university. Walk these streets and you really do walk in the footsteps of giants. A roll call of Britain's great and good, the famous and the infamous, have attended its colleges.
We will visit Christ Church College, arguably Oxford's finest and most aristocratic college; it has produced thirteen British prime ministers. In the first Harry Potter film, Christ Church provided Hogwart's staircase where Mrs McGonagall greets the schoolchildren upon their arrival and Christ Church dining room was the model for Hogwarts dining hall (used in the sorting ceremony). You'll see where Lewis Carroll took his inspiration for the white rabbit, elongated necks and Mad Hatter tea parties in his book 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'. Our walk will take us past many picture-perfect College courtyards to the Bodleian Library and Radcliffe Camera, which take centre stage at the very heart of the university. For Harry Potter fans there's more – we can see the Bodleian library, where Harry creeps at night under his invisible cloak, and the Divinity School which was the location of Hogwart's hospital. We can visit picturesque New College, which appears in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Its lovely cloisters provided the location for the scene in which Malfoy is turned into a ferret after taunting Harry about the forthcoming Tri-wizard Tournament. Our walk includes several of the locations used in the filming of The Golden Compass, starring Nicole Kidman.
Oxford isn't all academia and fine architecture. It has plenty of shopping and a fine array of pubs. If you like, we can visit the hostelries where the likes of C.S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia) and J.R.R. Tolkien (Lord of the Rings) drank.
After lunch we'll travel through the delightful southern Cotswolds region of charming stone villages, Tolkein's inspiration for the 'The Shire' in the Hobbit. We'll see if the locals have hairy feet! It's then on to Blenheim Palace, the ancestral home of the Dukes of Marlborough and one of the most impressive stately homes in England. The palace was built on Queen's Anne's instruction for John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, as a reward for his victory over the French at the Battle of Blenheim in 1704.
We'll enter the palace grounds by the Triumphal Gate and the great vista of lake, bridge and distant palace will take your breath away; don't worry I'll stop for photographs! We enter the house by the great hall and then pass through a suite of staterooms sumptuously ornamented with portraits, sculpture, china and fine furniture. Marlborough's military triumphs are depicted in a series of splendid tapestries. Sir Winston Churchill, a descendant of the 1st Duke, was born in a modest room of the palace. If you have an interest in Winston Churchill we can also visit his grave in the nearby village of Bladon.
The 2,200 acre park with its vast lawns and Italianate water terraces are a delight. If you have young children, they may wish to explore the traditional yew hedge maze, butterfly house and adventure playground.
This tour is also available as Oxford and Cotswolds countryside only.
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