4 days tailor made from $3,290 pp
From $3,290 pp
At a glance
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Don't forget that all of our itineraries are totally customized and so this is just an idea of what we can build for you.
The English country house is one of the great inventions of British civilization. For three centuries these estates shaped the landscape, defined a way of life, and played host to the kind of private world that rarely made it into the history books. What did make it in tells a more interesting story than the official version suggests.
Blenheim Palace, one of the grandest houses in England, sits in grounds that were designed by a man, Capability Brown, who transformed the entire country’s relationship with landscape. The houses of Bath’s Royal Crescent hosted a Georgian social scene that Austen observed with forensic precision and no small amount of irony. And running through the country house tradition, largely unacknowledged until recently, is a rich seam of LGBTQ+ history.
These were places where unconventional lives could be lived at a discreet remove from public scrutiny, where artists, writers, and those who didn’t fit the prescribed mold found space to exist on their own terms.
Today the finest of these properties have become something else entirely: some of the most exceptional places to stay in the world. This itinerary takes you through the heart of England over eight days, spending time at Blenheim Palace, The Royal Crescent Hotel and Spa in Bath, and Chewton Glen in the New Forest, three addresses that represent the very best of what the English country house tradition has become.
As a UK-based luxury travel company with over a decade of experience crafting LGBTQ+ itineraries across Britain, Out Of Office knows these properties, their teams, and their possibilities better than anyone. We handle every detail so that your only job is to enjoy one of the most quietly spectacular corners of Europe.
In detail
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Don't forget that most of our itineraries can be totally customized. Our expert team will be able to talk you through all the options.
Day 1: Arrive in London
Your driver meets you at Heathrow and transfers you to your hotel in central London. Tonight is for settling in, a quiet dinner, and an early night. Tomorrow the countryside begins.
Day 2: London to the Cotswolds
Your driver collects you mid-morning for the drive west out of London into Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire, the landscape changing within an hour from the motorway into something that looks almost impossibly English.
Honey-stone villages, dry-stone walls, church spires above trees. You arrive in the Cotswolds in time for lunch in one of the area’s finest restaurants before checking into your manor house hotel, the kind of property that has been receiving guests for centuries and shows no signs of hurrying.
The afternoon is yours to explore. Bourton-on-the-Water, Burford, Chipping Campden, the Cotswolds rewards walking and wandering above almost anything else. Dinner at the hotel tonight.
Day 3: The Cotswolds at Pace
A full day with no agenda beyond enjoyment. A morning walk through the surrounding countryside, a visit to a National Trust estate or garden if the season is right, and lunch at a village pub that has been doing this longer than most restaurants have existed.
In the afternoon, Blenheim Palace is within easy reach, one of the grandest country houses in England and the birthplace of Winston Churchill, set in a landscape designed by Capability Brown that takes the breath away on a clear day. Back to the hotel for dinner and the particular pleasure of a long evening with nowhere to be.
Day 4: Cotswolds to Bath
The drive south from the Cotswolds to Bath takes under an hour and passes through some of the most beautiful villages in England. Bath itself is a UNESCO World Heritage city and one of the great Georgian achievements in European urban planning, built almost entirely from the same warm limestone that gives it its distinctive golden glow.
Check into The Royal Crescent Hotel and Spa, one of the most celebrated addresses in England, occupying two townhouses at the centre of the city’s most iconic architectural set piece.
The curved terrace of thirty terraced houses that forms the Royal Crescent is one of the finest examples of Georgian architecture anywhere in the world, and staying at its heart is an experience with few equivalents in British travel. Dinner tonight in the city.
Day 5: Bath
Visit the Roman Baths in the morning, one of the best-preserved ancient monuments in northern Europe, followed by a walk through the Circus and along the Pulteney Bridge that crosses the Avon.
The Jane Austen Centre is a short walk from the hotel for those whose interest in the city runs through its most famous literary resident, and the fashion and design museum at the Assembly Rooms is worth an hour of anyone’s time.
The spa at The Royal Crescent is the right way to spend the afternoon, before dinner either at the hotel or at one of the city’s best restaurants.
Day 6: Bath to the New Forest
South from Bath through Wiltshire and Hampshire, the landscape opening into the ancient woodland of the New Forest, one of the oldest and most atmospheric corners of England. William the Conqueror established it as a royal hunting ground in 1079, and large parts of it have changed remarkably little since.
Your destination is Chewton Glen on the edge of the forest, one of the great country house hotels in England and a property that has been setting the standard for this kind of experience for decades. The hotel sits in 130 acres of grounds with direct access to the coast and a spa that is consistently ranked among the finest in the country. Check in, take a walk through the grounds to the sea, and let the place do what it does best.
Day 7: The New Forest and the Coast
A day built entirely around the pleasures of one exceptional hotel and its surroundings. A morning walk through the forest, where New Forest ponies still roam freely across the open heathland. The spa for the afternoon. The hotel’s restaurant for lunch and dinner, a kitchen that takes the Hampshire countryside seriously and works with local producers to deliver food that justifies the journey on its own.
For those who want to explore further, Lymington and Beaulieu are both within easy reach, the latter home to the National Motor Museum and the ruins of a thirteenth century abbey.
Day 8: Return to London and Departure
Your driver collects you after a leisurely breakfast and transfers you back to London and on to Heathrow.
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