The Ridgeway - 4 Things to Know Before Visiting

The Vale and Downland Museum is situated in the bustling market town of Wantage and has lots to offer for a fun, interactive family day out. It offers a wide range of services, including galleries interpreting the cultural heritage of the Vale of White Horse region, temporary exhibitions, a library, a gift shop, and a cafe with a delightful terrace and patio garden.

Didcot Railway Centre is a former Great Western Railway engine-shed and locomotive stabling point located in Didcot. It has a fine collection of over 20 locomotives, passenger coaches and freight wagons. Visitors will be able to take a trip behind one of the Great Western Railway’s steam express engines on the Centre’s demonstration line at weekends and Wednesdays.

Welford Park is a private estate with a fabulous snowdrop collection. They thrive on chalky soil. Parkland and gardens surrounding an elegant Queen Anne manor. The gardens are best known for the Snowdrop Woods, with early flowering snowdrops in bloom through February and early March. The estate opens its grounds to the public every year for about four weeks to enable visitors to see the carpets of snowdrops that line the riverbanks and flow through the nearby woods.

The Thames Path National Trail is a wonderful way to explore the River Thames. This long distance walking route starts at the source of the river in a field in the Cotswolds and follows the banks of the Thames for 184 miles (294km) through several rural counties before entering the City of London and finishing at the Thames Barrier in Greenwich.

Pendon Museum, located in Long Wittenham near Didcot, Oxfordshire, England, is a museum that displays scale models, in particular a large scene representing parts of the Vale of White Horse in the 1920s and 1930s. The museum's main feature is one of the world's finest landscape model of parts of Oxfordshire and Berkshire as they were around 1930. It includes exact models of buildings, of railways and other transport. The entrance fee includes an audio guide. Family trails are available too.

A stunning collection of dramatic and rare plant species and creatures of the rainforest that thrive in tropical temperatures. A visit to The Living Rainforest is a rare opportunity to see some of the wonderful plants and wildlife that the world is losing as rainforests disappear. The Living Rainforest has been accredited by the Council for Learning Outside of the Classroom and awarded the LOtC Quality Badge. Each year around 25,000 children visit the Living Rainforest as part of their school's