Places to explore near Luton

Beech woods and chalk downland within easy reach of London, laced with old ridge paths and grazing red kites

3 km N

Two vast airship hangars built for the R101 that still dominate the flat land south-east of Bedford, among the largest structures in the country.

3.1 km SW

Hertfordshire's grand circuit from the Royce Stone at Royston — chalk streams, commons and country houses for nearly 200 miles.

5.7 km SW · Hertfordshire

A chalk hilltop of beech and ash woodland, crossed by the Icknield Way.

8.3 km N

Chalk escarpment with gliders and sweeping views.

8.4 km W

Common-side dining pub on the edge of Harpenden.

8.7 km SE

A ten-acre garden planted between the wars in the outline of a cathedral, with grass avenues for nave and transepts and 'walls' of trees, a memorial to the fallen.

8.8 km W

A vast recumbent lion cut into Dunstable Downs in the early 1930s to mark the zoo below — big enough to see from the air.

10 km W

Secluded lane-end hamlet of George Bernard Shaw's home, a ruined old church and a Palladian eyecatcher church built as a folly.

12 km SE · Hertfordshire

Deep wooded Iron Age earthwork on the edge of Wheathampstead, thought to be part of a stronghold of the Catuvellauni tribe.

12.1 km SE

A Gothic Victorian house reworked by the novelist Bulwer-Lytton, with Lutyens gardens.

12.8 km E

Bare chalk hilltop at the north-east end of the Ridgeway, an Iron Age hillfort with sweeping views over three counties.

13.6 km W

Beech woods and chalk downs on the Chilterns edge.

14 km SW

French-style mansion and formal baroque gardens.

14.3 km N

Granite column of 1832 rising above the Ashridge beeches near Aldbury, climbable in summer for a thirty-mile view across the Chilterns.

14.5 km SW

Rows of lavender and sunflowers you can walk and cut on a chalk hillside at Ickleford, above Hitchin, at their best in high summer.

14.9 km NE

Historic city grown from the Roman town of Verulamium, its cathedral and medieval streets rising above the Ver and Verulamium Park.

14.9 km S · Hertfordshire

Long Norman abbey church over Roman Verulamium.

15.2 km S

Chiltern-edge village with a duck pond, old stocks and whipping post on the green, timbered cottages climbing towards Ashridge woods.

15.3 km SW · Hertfordshire

London to Birmingham by water — the trunk route of the canal age, with arms reaching Leicester, Aylesbury, Northampton and Paddington.

15.6 km S · spans 9 counties

Handsome Georgian estate village with an elegant high street of independent shops, gateway to Woburn Abbey and its safari park.

16.9 km NW · Bedfordshire

Nature reserve in a former chalk quarry near Pitstone, with wetland birds, chalk flowers and a lakeside visitor centre.

17.3 km W

Ducal seat with deer park and safari grounds.

17.3 km NW

Four Victorian reservoirs built to feed the Grand Union Canal on the Chiltern edge near Tring, now a noted birdwatching reserve.

18.7 km SW

Four hundred acres of woodland, heath and meadow on the Greensand Ridge near Leighton Buzzard, with a lakeside cafe and hilltop views.

18.7 km NW

A Capability Brown parkland on the Greensand Ridge with wide views, ancient oaks and Katherine's Cross marking a lost Tudor palace.

18.9 km N

The romantic ruined shell of a 1621 mansion above Ampthill, reputedly Bunyan's 'House Beautiful', commanding views across the Marston vale.

19 km N

Walter Rothschild's own zoological museum in Tring, its Victorian galleries crammed with mounted animals from around the world.

19.4 km SW

A half-timbered former Rothschild home, with a yew-and-box sundial and terraced lawns.

19.9 km W

Jacobean palace of the Cecils and Elizabeth I.

20 km SE

The Making of Harry Potter at Leavesden, a walk through the original film sets, props and Diagon Alley near Watford.

20.9 km S

A Humphry Repton landscape of lakes and meadows, home to an ancient Great Oak.

22 km SE

Greene King ales fetched by the jug straight from the cellar in a quarry-tiled village pub with no bar counter.

23.3 km N

Estate village of picture-book thatched cottages, restored by the Shuttleworth family, with the Swiss Garden and vintage aerodrome on its doorstep.

23.3 km N · Bedfordshire

A theatrical Regency Swiss garden of winding paths, follies and a chalet cottage.

24.2 km N

Down the Lea from its source at Leagrave to the Thames at Limehouse — flat towpath walking through Hertford and the Olympic Park.

0 km N · spans 4 counties

Capability Brown's unusual octagonal walled garden of the 1760s, restored by volunteers.

1.6 km S

The Chiltern Society's grand loop through four counties of beechwood and chalk, grown from a Millennium project into 177 miles.

3.9 km NE · spans 5 counties

The missing middle of the 'oldest road in Britain', linking the Ridgeway at Ivinghoe Beacon to the Peddars Way at Knettishall Heath.

5.1 km N · spans 7 counties

Around Bedfordshire in John Bunyan's footsteps — Elstow, Bedford and the chalk rises he recast as the Delectable Mountains.

5.1 km N · Bedfordshire & Hertfordshire

Grade II-listed country pub near Harpenden, settled into the Hertfordshire countryside since 1765.

6.8 km SE

A country park in Bedfordshire.

8.2 km W