Day trip from London to Oxford

We went to Oxford and Blenheim Palace on the same day, but I think we were coming south from the Lake District to the Cotswolds, and we had a rental vehicle. Still very doable, I would think.

The easy answer is Oxford and Blenheim palace- but you could end up spending a good amount of time at each of them. From Oxford (by car) you could also get to the Cotswolds (West). What I would tend to do is do oxford and then go a little south and take country roads through the Thames side villages back toward London- Henley on Thames is a good village to aim at

Round trip for one person on the coach Oxford Tube is only 16 pounds. We did it in July, no problem going up, delays on the roads coming back meant it took almost two hours and made us late for the Globe. Combination of an accident and a traffic light on Hyde Park that wasn't changing. Otherwise, the trip was easy. Oxford was nice, took a good tour from the TI that gave plenty of good suggestions for places to visit and things to do. Could easily take up a whole day. Do climb to the top of the church tower for the view - absolutely lovely. Themed tours are also offered if you're a Harry Potter or Morse fan.

Between visiting colleges, museums, churches, etc., you can easily spend the entire day in Oxford. If you don't want to spend the whole day in the city, you can also catch the regular bus to Blenheim from the Oxford bus station. Take note of when the places that you want to see are open - most of the colleges are only open in the afternoon, so if you want to see Blenheim you might want to go there in the morning. There are also a number of good restaurants in Oxford, so you could have dinner there before returning to London.

I would say give Oxford a whole day! I stayed for 6 days and loved it! The cost of train or bus depends on how early you book it. If you're driving you could probably do the Blenheim Castle, too. Oxford has several colleges which you can tour - I was at Worcester - lovely, but see a few! A few other things to check out: Elephant & Child pub where The Inklings met for 20+ years (Tolkien, C.S. Lewis); Blackwells bookstore; catdh a play at one of the colleges...

I would definitely take the train from London to Oxford and not a car in case you were thinking of it. ; ) You can easily spend a day there exploring the city and colleges. I was recently in both Oxford and Cambridge and enjoyed both. Pam