Exploring Blenheim Palace Grounds – for Free

This weekend, we traded a Saturday lie-in for an early morning trip into Oxfordshire. I’m usually the (wo)man with the plan, so I always have an underlying fear of ‘What if this is a terrible idea?’ when we hit the road. I needn’t have feared. This was possibly one of the best in-country trips to date, and amazingly it was completely free.

We’d been planning to explore Blenheim Palace since last summer, but we never quite got round to it. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, it’s the only non-royal palace in England – tickets start at £16 per person to access the parks and gardens, and £27 to include the Palace. However, needless to say, I was pleased to discover just recently that there are several public footpaths into the grounds which allow you to explore much of it (roughly 2,000 acres) for free, except for the private gardens and the Palace itself.

There are multiple free gates into the park grounds which constitute public footpaths, and are completely free and legal to use; some links I found useful were Where Goes Rose, Chris Rodgers (via A44) and Free Blenheim (via Woodstock).

The route we decided on was Combe Lodge (OX29 8ND) – also pinned here for your convenience – where you can drive up and park for free before entering the gate pictured below.

May I add here, the drive itself is ridiculously scenic and we even saw three deer on the motorway who had thankfully had reached the other side safely. Seeing deer has been a dream of mine and I never seem to catch a glimpse, so the trip was off to a positive start.

Once you get to the gate at Combe Lodge and enter the grounds, take a left and continue walking on.

Pace yourself and absorb the breathtaking views; we caught the beautiful crisp air of a sunny October morning and it was perfect.

Amongst the lush thick greenery, we encountered pheasants, a corn field and sheep – before reaching the Lake (which was dug out by hand in the 1770s). And for any Potter fans, opposite the Lake stands the famous Harry Potter ‘Order of the Phoenix’ tree which was carved and used for a scene in the film.

From here, you can also see the Grand Bridge in the distance.

If you keep walking on, you will eventually reach the Palace gates which itself is a lovely walk. Of course, do bear in mind that you can’t enter without a ticket.

At this point, we were starving and so we headed swiftly back to the gate at Combe Lodge to head back to Reading. I’d definitely recommend taking food; the park grounds are perfect for a picnic whilst you take in the fresh air, plus it complements the trek nicely.

Overall, this has to be our best nature walk trip thus far and I’d absolutely recommend it – even better that it cost us nothing at all.