Adventures around Cheltenhamwith PlusBus
Elegantly sprawling with its Georgian terraces, on the picturesque fringes of the Cotswolds, Cheltenham combines the urban pleasures of shopping, eating out and visiting museums with easy access to some spectacular countryside. Add PlusBus when you buy a train ticket to Cheltenham Spa and you can have unlimited bus travel all day around the town and beyond. Take your pick of hilly walks, cultural outings, a collection of vintage aeroplanes and a whole lot more by bus.
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1. The Wilson Museum and Gallery
Ask for PlusBus when you get your train ticket or show your ticket when you arrive at the station to buy it as an add-on. The PlusBus ticket is useful straight away as the centre of town is over a mile from the station.
- The Cotswolds were a key area for the Arts and Crafts Movement and the collection at the Wilson Museum and Art Gallery reflects this. It includes gracefully-carved wooden chairs, ceramics and metalwork. There’s an exquisite cabinet, decorated with woodland plants and creatures, colourful stained glass, or rich leather panels, embossed in gold with a sailing ship and stylised flower. You can also see Dutch and Belgian paintings and explore the history of Cheltenham. It’s all free to enter.
- So how do I get to the Wilson Museum and Art Gallery by bus? Leave Cheltenham Spa station, following signs to Queen’s Road. Cross the car park and climb the steps to find a bus stop on the nearside of the road. Bus D leaves from here every 20 minutes. Get off at Clarence Parade. Walk a few steps in the direction the bus was heading and turn left to find the museum.
- The area is full of great places to eat. In particular, the museum’s own café, the Wilson Kitchen. This not-for-profit space is popular for working, meeting and playing (there are toys and pens for kids). It serves up tasty open sandwiches, coffee and cake.
- Next door to the museum, don’t miss the Minster, Cheltenham’s only surviving medieval building. There’s an impressive spire rising from a green churchyard, Victorian stained glass and elegant stone tracery in the windows.
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2. Jet Age Museum
For a very different kind of museum hop on the bus towards Gloucester to visit the Jet Age Museum, open at weekends to celebrate Gloucestershire’s aviation history.
- Exhibits include a replica of Britain’s first jet, the Gloster E28/39, which first took off in 1941 from an airfield between Gloucester and Cheltenham. There are also examples of Britain’s first jet fighter, the Meteor. You can even join a tour of the cockpits, see the controls up close and imagine what it might have been like to fly one.
- So how do I reach the Jet Age Museum by bus? Bus 94 leaves from Cheltenham Promenade (Stop 3) every 15 minutes (half-hourly on Sundays) and passes the Jet Age Museum’s Meteor Business Park entrance. Get off at the stop called Staverton, opposite the white Safran building, about three minutes’ stroll from the museum.
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3. Cotswold Way
The 100-mile Cotswold Way is one of England’s great National Trails. Undulating through the Cotswold hills, it passes towns and villages, forests and valleys. The trail loops around Cheltenham with some incredible panoramas across the town from Charlton Kings Common. Golden gorse-fringed valleys, bluebells woods and rolling green hills: this is classic Cotswold countryside and really worth seeing.
- One great thing about not driving is that you don’t need to get back to a parked car. Your PlusBus ticket can take you out into the beautiful countryside around Cheltenham with fabulous views from the bus windows and even better ones after a short scenic climb.
- A roughly-three-mile stretch of the glorious Cotswold Way starts from one bus stop and ends near another, taking in one of the highlights of this long-distance route. It starts from Seven Springs, where the walk descends to a main road and immediately sets off again up a lane on the far side.
- So, how do I get to Seven Springs by bus? Bus 51 leaves from Cheltenham Promenade (Stop 1) opposite the striking Neptune fountain. The journey to Seven Springs takes 18 minutes.
- Look out of the bus window to see elegant Imperial Square and Montpelier Gardens, surrounded by the classic Georgian terraces. Next up is Cheltenham College with a neo-gothic chapel and big playing field. The bus rolls on past more parks and genteel houses with wrought iron balconies and arts-and-crafts-style rustic porches. Through the village of Charlton Kings and, just past the Clock Tower pub, the bus officially enters the Cotswolds National Landscape.
- From Seven Springs bus stop, you can see the Cotswolds Way coming steeply down the hill behind you. But you are heading the other way: cross the road and follow the sign right down a country lane, which soon starts to climb…
- Beyond Charlton Kings Common, go through the gate and turn right on a stony path, leaving the Cotswold Way and leading downhill by a fence. Keep straight across a cycle trail and keep to the lower left-hand path, curving right downhill.
- An old lime kiln stands at the foot of the path – one of many in the area. Walk past the lime kiln and take the middle path, leading down between a wall and fence. Follow this path, winding down to a lane and then follow the lane down to a road and turn right down into Leckhampton with a choice of bus stops, pubs and shops. Bus L runs back into Cheltenham roughly hourly.
- For more car-free adventures in the area, see our car-free guide to the Cotswolds and our PlusBus tour of Gloucester.
