Places to explore near Milton Keynes

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

1.8 km E · spans 9 counties

Twin lakes in Milton Keynes with a lakeside park, watersports and a Buddhist Peace Pagoda on the northern shore.

3 km NE

Victorian mansion and huts at Bletchley where Second World War codebreakers cracked Enigma, now a museum of the work and its machines.

4.8 km S

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

12.3 km SE

Ducal seat with deer park and safari grounds.

12.6 km SE

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

12.8 km SE · Bedfordshire

Ancient royal hunting forest of 600-year-old oaks south of Northampton, with waymarked trails through the ancient woodland.

14.2 km NW

Canal village on the Grand Union where locks, a towpath and the old corn mill turned Canal Museum draw walkers and boaters to its waterside pubs.

15.5 km NW · Northamptonshire

Three-storey former corn mill by the locks telling 200 years of narrowboat life on the Grand Union Canal.

15.6 km NW

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

16.5 km S

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

17.4 km E

Sublime Georgian landscape garden of temples and lakes.

17.4 km W

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

18.7 km E

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

20.4 km SE

Riverside village west of Bedford known for its picturesque Ouse bridge, green with a round lock-up, and adjoining country park.

20.5 km NE · Bedfordshire

Tall brick tower mill above the village green at Quainton, restored to work under wind on some Sundays.

21.2 km SW

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

21.6 km SE

Guillotine-gated locks and water meadows from Northampton to Peterborough, where the Nene slips out into the Fens.

22.1 km N · Northamptonshire & Cambridgeshire

Working steam railway museum at Quainton Road station in the vale, with locomotives, carriages and demonstration lines.

22.7 km SW

French-style mansion and formal baroque gardens.

24.2 km E

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

24.4 km SE

Chalk escarpment with gliders and sweeping views.

24.8 km SE

The Great Ouse walked source to sea — from a pub garden at Syresham to the old quay at King's Lynn, 150 miles across five counties.

3.3 km NW · spans 5 counties

Old Watling Street coaching town now within Milton Keynes, whose rival inns the Cock and the Bull are said to have given us the cock-and-bull story.

6.7 km W · Buckinghamshire

Leighton Buzzard to Gamlingay along Bedfordshire's wooded sandstone ridge, waymarked with a muntjac in a nod to Woburn's escapees.

9.8 km SE · Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire & Cambridgeshire

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

10.1 km E · Bedfordshire & Hertfordshire

A Site of Special Scientific Interest in Northamptonshire.

11.1 km W

A country park in Buckinghamshire.

11.4 km N

Big spired church over the Great Ouse at Olney, linked to the hymn-writers Cowper and Newton and the town's pancake race.

12.8 km N

Two small period gardens behind the poet Cowper's Olney house, a summer flower garden and a restored kitchen garden.

13.1 km N