Places to explore near Swindon

Rolling chalk downland above the Vale of the White Horse, threaded by one of Britain's oldest roads

3.2 km S

The northernmost Wiltshire horse, reputedly cut in 1864, clinging to a steep slope above the village.

8.1 km SW

A neat square-set horse cut for Queen Victoria's coronation in 1838, on Hackpen Hill just below the Ridgeway.

9.8 km S

The river from its Cotswold trickle to the Thames Barrier — the gentlest long walk in Britain.

9.9 km N · spans 7 counties

The non-tidal Thames — 45 locks of managed river between Cricklade's meadows and the tideway at Teddington.

9.9 km N · spans 7 counties

Neolithic chambered long barrow ringed by beech trees on the Ridgeway, named in legend for a Saxon smith-god.

12.9 km E

Cotswold Water Park village where the infant River Thames threads between cottages and old stone crosses.

14.2 km NW · Wiltshire

Britain's oldest chalk hill figure, a 110-metre stylised horse cut into the downs above the Vale of White Horse.

15 km E

Flat-topped chalk knoll below the White Horse, its bare crown linked in legend to St George slaying the dragon.

15 km E

Vast henge and circle wrapping a whole village.

15.2 km S

Downland village that sits inside the world's largest prehistoric stone circle, surrounded by the henge bank, Silbury Hill and long barrows.

15.2 km S · Wiltshire

An Italianate water garden designed by Harold Peto in 1904, stepping through rills.

15.4 km NE

A village-green pub near Cirencester, The Good Pub Guide's best new entry for 2019.

15.8 km N

North Wessex Downs town with one of England's widest high streets, colonnaded and tiled, between the college and the Kennet.

15.8 km S · Wiltshire

Neolithic avenue of paired standing stones winding south from Avebury towards The Sanctuary, its northern stretch re-erected in the 1930s.

16 km S

A small horse cut by Marlborough schoolboys in 1804, tucked onto Granham Hill above the Kennet.

16.4 km S

Europe's largest man-made prehistoric mound.

16.6 km S

Small Coln-side town whose church keeps the only complete set of medieval stained glass in England.

16.7 km N · Gloucestershire

One of Britain's largest Neolithic chambered tombs, open to walk inside, within sight of Silbury Hill.

17.2 km S

A perforated sarsen boulder in a Kingston Lisle garden that can be sounded like a horn, tied to legends of King Alfred.

17.4 km E

William Morris's Tudor riverside retreat.

17.5 km NE

Thames-meadow village of limestone cottages built around Kelmscott Manor, William Morris's country retreat.

17.6 km NE · Oxfordshire

Wiltshire's second-oldest white horse, cut in 1780 on Cherhill Down beneath the Lansdowne Monument.

18 km SW

A gas-lit, one-room Cotswold alehouse with beer poured from the tap, run single-handed for decades and beautifully unspoilt.

18.1 km N

A 100-foot brick-and-stone tower in a hilltop wood, England's last great folly, built for Lord Berners in 1935.

18.4 km NE

Honey-coloured limestone villages scattered across rolling sheep country, and paths enough to link them all up

18.8 km N

An ancient working woodland of oaks and beeches, crossed by Capability Brown's mile-long Grand Avenue.

19.7 km S

One of Wiltshire's highest downs near Pewsey, crowned by an ancient enclosure with sweeping views over the Vale of Pewsey.

20.7 km S

Cotswold village inn near Lechlade with a strong reputation for produce-led cooking.

20.7 km NE

The largest of the well-kept Wiltshire horses, cut in 1812 high on Milk Hill above the Vale of Pewsey.

21.1 km S

The broad-beam crossing of southern England — river, canal and river again from Bristol's Avon to the Thames at Reading, over the chalk by the Caen Hill flight.

21.7 km S · spans 5 counties

'Capital of the Cotswolds', a handsome market town on Roman Corinium with a cathedral-like church and a great park.

21.8 km NW · Gloucestershire

The influential garden Rosemary Verey made her own, with a knot garden and laburnum walk.

21.9 km N

England's longest inland waymarked trail, tracing Charles II's escape route from defeat at Worcester in 1651 to the ship waiting at Shoreham.

21.9 km NW · spans 14 counties

Norman abbey with a dramatic ruined nave.

22 km W

England's oldest borough, a hilltop town above the Avon crowned by its ruined 12th-century abbey and market cross.

22.1 km W · Wiltshire

One of England's oldest open-air pools, opened in 1870 beside Cirencester Park, spring-fed and run by volunteers.

22.3 km NW

Weavers' cottages Morris called England's loveliest.

22.7 km N · Gloucestershire

North Wessex Downs coaching inn with rooms, an olive best country pub.

23.6 km SE

Village freehouse near Savernake Forest, an olive best country pub.

23.6 km SE

The newest Wiltshire horse, cut on Roundway Hill for the millennium in 1999 — and the only one that faces right.

24.4 km SW

Ornate classical portal of one of Britain's longest canal tunnels, in the woods above Coates.

24.6 km NW

Boston to Abbotsbury down the limestone belt — 290 miles waymarked in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support.

24.7 km NW · spans 10 counties

A country park in Wiltshire.

2.4 km SE

Family brewery founded in 1843 at Kingsdown, Swindon, still brewing traditional ales with tours of its Victorian brewhouse.

4 km N

A country park in Wiltshire.

4.2 km NW

Britain's oldest road — a prehistoric chalk track past Avebury, hillforts and white horses.

7.5 km SE · spans 5 counties

A Site of Special Scientific Interest in Wiltshire.

7.6 km E

A country park in Wiltshire.

7.6 km S

A Berkshire chalk river from the Marlborough Downs to the Thames at Reading, shadowed most of the way by the Kennet & Avon Canal.

9.7 km SW · Berkshire & Wiltshire