We had booked this trip for the previous month but it had been postponed due to lockdown. We re-booked and to be honest this was a much better time to see the Christmas lights as it was the weekend before Christmas. But let’s start at the beginning.
We moved on from Oxford to the campsite, which was only 6 miles up the road. We stayed at Bladdon Chains, a Caravan and Motorhome Club Site. The site was very empty due to changes in covid restrictions. Oxford was still at tier two but many areas, including where we live, had gone into tier three. As we were already in Oxford when this happened we decided to stay. And I’m so glad we did.
We walked the mile or so from the campsite to the Palace to tour the house. To be honest I was a little disappointed with the Palace as you could only see a few rooms. Although what was open gave a great insight into how the other half live!
I had booked afternoon tea at the Palace for us as a Christmas and as the tour was a lot shorter than I thought it would be, we had a few hours to wait. Not really fancying walking back to the campsite we asked if we could have our tea earlier. Then we could at least stretch out the meal to fill some time. The tea arrived and what a spread it was, sandwiches, cakes and scones. Now we like our food, but even we couldn’t finish it!
By now it was dark so we headed off to the start of the lights tour to see if we could also do this earlier than booked. This was no problem as many people had cancelled. Walking round the track was truly amazing, every section had different Christmas music playing and the most incredible light shows. It took about an hour and we left feeling like Christmas had started.
Back at the campsite we turned the heating on. We were on electric hook up so thought we may as well use it and save our gas. Both of us were still full from our afternoon tea that we skipped dinner.
The following morning was grey and dull but I had plotted a cycle route on Garmin to see the local area. Off we set kitted out in all our rain gear. The route we took was 15 miles long and finished up along a very muddy canal where we saw a narrow boat going through a really narrow lock. We managed to avoid the rain and returned to the van to get cleaned up. That evening we went to a pub called The Bear in Woodstock for dinner. However, as we were both quite tired after all the walking and cycling, we decided to get a taxi.
A great few days of culture, great food and Christmas fun.
Bladdon Chains CMCC site
Mileage – 54
Route – M4
Campsite
Cost – £53.90
