What to See in Countryside around London

Last summer my husband had a meeting in London. I took train to Salisbury, spent one night. Took train from Salisbury to Bath and left luggage at place near train station(listed in Rick's Great Britain book) while I toured Bath. I'm not as enamoured with Bath as Rick is (did not go to Roman baths because I've been to Pompeii), so took train to Cardiff for two nights. Spent one day at Welsh Folk Museum and one day at Caerphilly Castle, both accessible by public transportation. Lots of other good options on train from London-Dover Castle, Windsor, Cambridge or Oxford. There are books about day trips from London that give info with how long train trip is. Because of hotel prices in London, you will want to spend night wherever you go instead of doing day trips from London.

My daughter and I (she was 20 at the time) took a day trip and saw Stonehenge at sunrise, Lacock and Bath. Our tour was through Viator and we were very pleased with it. We met near a London landmark and then had a comfortable bus ride to Stonehenge. Our tour was a special one, in that we paid a little more for a small group experience that let us wander among the stones. Most tours you are behind a chain about 30 feet away from the stones and you just walk a circle around them. We had a nice chunk of time to go all in, our and around, watch the fog lift and the sun start beaming through the stones. It was amazing! They also offer a tour so you can visit at sunset. After that we went to the old village of Lacock and had a traditional English breakfast at an Inn that dates to the 1500's. Lacock is a special village, in that it still resembles itself from the 1500's. Scenes from movies, such as Pride and Prejudice and Harry Potter, to name a couple, have been filmed there. After that we drove to the town of Bath, home of Jane Austen. We had free time there, which my daughter and I took advantage of to visit a local café and have hot chocolate and scones with clotted cream- YUM! Then we visited the Roman Baths and learned all about them. It was a lengthy tour, something like 10-11 hours total, but worth every penny. Had we more time, I also would have booked a tour to visit the Cotswolds. Happy planning!
Lisa

Countryside is difficult without a car, but there are numerous worthwhile smaller cities and towns. Even York is within easy reach because the train is very fast (two hours I think). So outside of London does not have to mean right outside of London. Bath is a great visit too and only 1.5 hours away by train, (Glastonbury or Salisbury only about an hour away from there). Salisbury Cathedral is spectacular, the area within the close is beautiful but the town outside that I was not that impressed with. I would focus on the area to the southeast/south of London, but that's based upon having seen the other parts mentioned more recently. Specifically Rye is a very pleasant little town easily reachable by train, and easy to connect to Dover (with an awesome castle), Canterbury, and Brighton (for the Royal Pavilion). Objectively York or Bather are higher on scale of tourist thrills if you have not already been to those two. Be aware that trains are very expensive in England if you just walk up and buy a ticket on the day of travel. Use rome2rio and bahn.de to figure out what's workable by train.

Please could you clarify what you want to see? All the suggestions so far are for towns and cities, not countryside. True countryside isn't easy to cover without a car, as public transport is limited.

If you are contemplating rail travel, please use nationalrail.co.uk, not a German website!

I would suggest Lewes, from where you could cover the South Downs or Rye. The New Forest would be another good option without travelling too far from London if you want countryside.

Jennifer has given you excellent advice.

There are many country houses and palaces that are a short rail ride from London.

You could do a number of trips by rail by yourself.
Hampton Court Palace is an easy short train ride to the outskirts of London.

Hever Castle, the home of Anne Boleyn (Henry the 8th's second wife...but not for very long)
and her family is a train ride outside of London.

Salisbury is an easy (longer) trip out of London.
Here you would want to stay overnight.

The Cotswolds can be reached by rail. The train goes to Moreton-In-Marsh.
Or you could take the train to Stratford-Upon-Avon, and then visit various Cotswold villages from there using this excellent tour company: www.gocotswolds.co.uk
Our friend Tom uses a small mini bus to give you a day tour of about 6 Cotswold villages.
You may want to stay in Stratford-Upon-Avon or Moreton-In-Marsh for a night or two. We can give you hotel and restaurant information for this. (Tom's tour also picks up in Moreton-In-Marsh.)
Lots of pretty countryside and walking trails in the Cotswolds.

If you are going to stay in London, you could use one of the many excellent London companies doing day trips.
This company has several good day trips. Premium Tours:
https://www.premiumtours.co.uk/category/out-of-london-tours-uk-britain-england

Another very good company is International Friends. Here are some of their day trips out of London:
https://www.internationalfriends.co.uk/small-group-day-trips-tours.html

Two more companies doing day trips out of London:
www.EvanEvansTours.com
www.goldentours.com (Gray Line)

The least expensive company doing day trips out of London is the excellent London Walks Company.
www.walks.com
Take a look at their day trips with a guide.

It depends on what you are interested in.

If you are able bodied and are looking for a hike, we took the train from London Victoria station to Eastbourne on the coast (about 1.5 hour train trip) and hiked up part of the South Downs way. We walked from the Eastbourne train station down to the ocean and then up a hill to the top of the cliffs at Beachy Head. If you would prefer not walking the big hill you can take an inexpensive cab ride from the train station to the Beachy Head Inn. You would walk from there to Birling Gap and then to the little town of East Dean. It's mostly rolling hills dotted with sheep, high chalk cliffs and great ocean views. In about an 8 mile loop you get a medium sized coastal town, rolling sheep fields, two light houses, a WWII memorial, lovely ocean views and a little town. I thought it was perfect.

http://www.nationaltrail.co.uk/south-downs-way/route/eastbourne-beachy-head-circular-walk

http://www.walkingbritain.co.uk/walk-2227-description

The "country" destinations for actual Londoners include Epping Forest, which you can get to by the Central Line or taking a train to Chingford. There aren't any major attractions there, but it's a nice bit of forest to walk in. You can see more details at https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/things-to-do/green-spaces/epping-forest/Pages/default.aspx

To reiterate, experiencing real countryside is pretty difficult without a car (except out the window of the train). The suggestion of train to Moreton-in-Marsh is a good one, if you are willing to experience the countryside by hiking into it, weather permitting. Otherwise you are in a small town/village and not the countryside. I prefer not to rent a car if I can avoid it, but we wanted to visit Devon and also determined the Cotswalds would be much easier with a car that without on our 2013 trip, so we went for the car. We stopped in Moreton-in-Marsh but I cannot remember whether it was one of the more interesting towns. We stayed in Chipping Campden which was great as a base for day tripping but without a car, three days there would be way too much there or in any Cotswalds town (for example if weather did not permit hiking into the country). Also it's widely known that bahn.de provides a reasonable and user friendly first take for multiple countries, to determine what's reasonable in terms of train connections. That said, absolutely go to local country sites if you want to book tickets or get more precise.

I used Viator also on a day trip to Dover and Canterbury. The castle at Dover is amazing and Canterbury Cathedral was the highlight of my trip. I would highly recommend a day trip to Dover/Canterbury.