Oxford, stone colleges an hour from London.

Oxford is the most common day trip from London, and with good reason: an hour by train from Paddington and you are in a honey-stone university city where almost everything is ten minutes' walk away. The university is not a campus but 36 colleges spread across the centre, each with its own quad, chapel and dining hall. Some can be visited with a ticket; others are seen from the gate. What costs nothing is what you remember most: Radcliffe Square, the museums and the meadows by the river.

How do you get there from London?

By train, which is how almost everyone goes. Great Western Railway leaves London Paddington almost every quarter of an hour on weekdays; the journey takes around an hour and the fastest trains take 52 minutes. Oxford station is about 15 minutes' walk from the centre. Buy your ticket in advance if you want a specific time: a same-day return without a reservation is considerably more expensive.

By coach, the Oxford Tube leaves from stops in central London, such as Victoria, 24 hours a day and up to every ten minutes. It is cheaper and you don't need to book, but with traffic it takes quite a lot longer than the train.

By car, better not. Oxford has traffic filters in the centre: if you cross them without a permit during operating hours you will get a fine, hire cars included. There are park-and-ride sites on the outskirts with a bus to the centre. By road, it takes an hour and a half or more from central London, depending on the traffic out of town.

What to see in a day

Start with Christ Church, the largest college, with a cathedral inside and the dining hall everyone recognises; buy a timed ticket. Then walk up St Aldate's to Carfax and Radcliffe Square, with the dome of the Radcliffe Camera, and climb the tower of the University Church to see it from above. If you have managed to get a place, go into the Bodleian Library on the one-hour guided tour.

In the afternoon, choose: the Ashmolean, free, if you like art and archaeology, or the Museum of Natural History, also free, if you are with children. From February to November, finish with an hour's punt on the River Cherwell from Magdalen Bridge.

With another day, or if you stay in Oxford, Blenheim Palace, in Woodstock, deserves half a day: a Baroque palace with an enormous park, half an hour away by bus.

When to go

Spring and autumn are the best times: the college gardens in bloom, fewer groups and the boats open. In summer the centre fills with groups and language-course students, and some colleges close for graduations or events: check each one's closure notices before you go. In winter it gets dark around half past four; the museums open as usual and the city has a different calm.

On Sundays almost everything opens, but later: the University Church tower is open from 12:00. The Covered Market opens on Sunday from 10:00 to 17:00.

How much does it cost?

The two big museums, the Ashmolean and the Natural History Museum with the Pitt Rivers, are free. What you pay for: Christ Church is around £23–25 per adult, the Bodleian's one-hour tour from £17.50, the tower £7 and an hour's punt £35 per boat. Eating in the market or a café costs £10–15; a sit-down meal, £30–45.