Adventures around Chelmsfordwith PlusBus
Chelmsford only became a city in 2012, when it was granted city status as part of The Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations, but its history goes back centuries. In the new city's museum you can learn more about Chelmsford's industrial past, including its role as the birthplace of radio. Nowadays, Chelmsford has great shops, restaurants and leisure activities too, as well as walks by the river and through flowering parks. A Chelmsford PlusBus ticket gives you unlimited bus travel around the whole area. Here are just three of the adventures you could have.
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1. Chelmsford Museum
The prize-winning, TV-broadcasting artist Grayson Perry was born in Chelmsford in 1960 and you can find out more about his work in Chelmsford Museum including a locally-themed pot. Wireless pioneer Guglielmo Marconi opened the world’s first radio factory in the town in 1899 and you can see the kind of equipment that was made there including a full replica of the Radio Room from the Titanic with all the communication devices, made in Marconi’s factory, which enabled the survivors to be rescued.
- Your PlusBus ticket can take you to Chelmsford Museum and lots of other places. Just add PlusBus when you buy your train ticket or buy it at the ticket office when you arrive.
- How do I get to Chelmsford Museum by bus? Exit from Chelmsford railway station onto Duke Street and turn immediately left to the bus stop nearby (Stand 11). Bus C1 stops here every 15 minutes (half-hourly on Sundays). It takes 9 minutes to reach the stop called Moulsham Street, passing Chelmsford cathedral and market and crossing a bridge with a lovely view along the river. Get off at Moulsham Street and follow the brown sign a few steps left to find the museum.
- Other exhibits to look out for are a stuffed Russian bear in the hallway, a captured Napoleonic eagle in the Essex Regiment Museum, upstairs inside the main museum, and lots more, exploring the history of Chelmsford, which stretches back beyond Roman times.
- The Hive Cafe and surrounding Oakland Park are great for refreshments or all kinds and there are more cafes a short walk away along Moulsham Street. When you need a bus back to the station or the centre of town, just cross the road you arrived on to the Wood Street stop near the roundabout. Bus C1 and several others stop here.
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2. Jump Street by Airhop
Towering multi-coloured climbing walls, the hugest trampoline park in Essex, the UK’s first baseball cages with augmented reality software, the county’s biggest soft play area and a whole lot more. Chelmsford’s epic leisure centre at Jump Street by Airhop is an enormous indoor adventure park and it is quite easy to get to with a PlusBus ticket.
- How do I get to Airhop Chelmsford by bus? The nearest bus stop is Chelmer Village Way. Lots of buses stop here including bus 371 every half an hour and hourly bus 47. From Chelmer Village Way bus stop, walk a few steps back and follow the pavement left at the roundabout into Richmond Road to find Jump Street on your left.
- Inside, you’ll find the boingy trampoline park with all kinds of features including a performance area with wall trampolines. There is also the all-year indoor Clip’n Climb climbing centre with dozens of different walls for climbers of all ages, skills and levels of experience. Thanks to Jump Street for the picture! Special attractions include a terrifying drop slide and other extreme challenges like the Leap of Faith and Stairway to Heaven.
- And toddlers can explore safely and happily in the new Kendrick’s Kingdom soft-play with its slides and rope bridges, tunnels, ball showers and four floors of adventure including a treasure chest, battle zone with cannons that shoot soft balls, nautical porthole-style window and a bungy Giant’s Causeway. And toddlers often love bus journeys too so what better way to get there?
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3. Walks around Chelmsford
The countryside around Chelmsford is beautiful and there are some great paths to follow. Here are a couple walks that you can easily reach with a PlusBus ticket.
- The Saffron Trail, one of several brilliant long-distance walks across Essex, follows a green, riverside corridor through Chelmsford on its 70-mile route from Southend to Saffron Walden. This short taster of the Saffron Trail is entirely inside the city, but feels quite rural at times. Catch bus 371 or bus 47 from the bus station (Stand 3) next to the railway station. Get off the stop called Fox and Raven, carefully cross Chelmer Village Way, and turn right at the roundabout onto Mill Vue Road. Follow this lane until it becomes a path and follow the path until it leads sharp right back along the river, soon crossing a green-railed footbridge.
- You can walk about three miles through the heart of Chelmsford, along Rivers Chelmer and Can, past various locks and mills and under a railway viaduct. Soon after walking under the viaduct, a path leads right up to the Admirals Park bus stop, where you can catch bus 59 back to the railway station.
- Also leading through Admiral’s Park, Chelmsford’s Centenary Circle is a 21-mile circular walk around the edge of the city. Each of its five sections are easily reached with a PlusBus ticket.
- Wherever you wander in Chelmsford, there is plenty to explore. For more ideas and adventures in the area, see our car-free guide.
