Cotswolds Coddiwomple – April 2025

The glorious spring sunshine that we experienced in spring inspired us to book an impromptu two night mini-break to Burford in the glorious Cotswolds.

Tim had plotted a picturesque, albeit long drive cross country from Kent, leaving early on a Sunday morning. We avoided motorways and traversed A roads, B roads and even a few single tracks here and there! 

One of our favourite stops is The Tea Barn at Durleighmarsh Farm, nestled in the South Downs near Petersfield. It’s a quintessential English cafe, tea is served in proper teapots, cups & saucers and as for their cakes, well I suggest you pop in and try for yourselves! This time though we gave them a miss and enjoyed breakfast instead (Tim can recommend the bacon sandwiches and I loved the French toast with apple compote and yoghort.)

The spring sunshine had warmed up enough to have the roof down on the car by the time we left and we meandered our way over to Lambourn, stopping off to stretch our legs at Ashdown Place before arriving in Burford about 6 hours after we’d left home.

I had booked a pub B&B at The Royal Oak in the centre of Burford, just off the main street so it was lovely and peaceful. It’s a Grade II listed building with thick stone walls and a cosy feel. Our room was spacious with pretty views over some gardens.

We fancied a bit of a walk before dinner and I’d found a map online that took us around the edge of the town, through a park and pretty footpaths before heading back into the centre where we enjoyed a locally produced pie in The Cotswolds Arms.

Burford is a picturesque medieaval town located on the river Windrush and is often referred to as the gateway to the Cotswolds. You certainly get the feeling that nothing much has changed over the years as the main street is lined with wonky buildings housing artisan shops, antiques shops, cafes, pubs and bakeries. The chemist has been there since 1734 and is England’s oldest pharmacy.  St John’s church is pretty impressive too.

I thought it would be nice to head to Bourton-On-The-Water for lunch after our walk, however we couldn’t get near the place, it was heaving with people. If it’s like that in April, it must be complete bedlam in the height of the summer months! Plan B was to meander our way up to the Slaughters. Little Slaughter was too busy to stop so we continued up to Upper Slaughter, which was much quieter and we were able to have a walk around. Cotswold villages have an atmosphere all of their own with the unique stone buildings and walls. They just ooze character. We didn’t find anywhere for lunch there though so we ambled slowly around to Stow In The Wold where we parked easily and found a bakery in one of the narrow alleyways where we sat in the sun and watched the world go slowly by. Heaven!

Our drive back to Burford through Moreton-in-Marsh and other sleepy villages rounded our day off perfectly. The good thing about staying in a small town is that there is more choice of eateries within walking distance from where we’re staying. This time we used the Burford House pub; delicious food (NB: only have the Red Thai Curry if you don’t mind a lot of chillies – Tim nearly overheated! It was fine when he took the seeds out of the chillies!)

Sadly the next day was time to head home, but not before a mild panic in the morning when Tim discovered he’d lost the car key! We turned the room upside down, unpacked and repacked our bag and couldn’t find it. The only other option was to retrace our steps from the previous night, so off he went while I repacked. 

I gently asked the Universe to help us find the key, having 100% faith that we would find it. Tim re-appeared five minutes later with the key in his hand . He’d retraced our evening walk back to the pub, which was thankfully open and the lady recognised him and said “have you come for this?” as she held up the key! Evidently it had fallen out of his pocket on the floor by our table. Thank you, Angels! 

Our journey home was smooth and incident free! It’s so important to make the most of these opportunities when we can. I’m sure we will return for another Cotswold Coddiwomple in the future.