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September 2007: As one of the UK's most popular visitor destinations, Oxford City is acknowledged yet again as the place to be with a number of recent awards. At the recent, prestigious Conde Nast Traveller Awards, Oxford was ranked top overall for culture and was amongst the top five favourite cities in England outside of London. This comes shortly after receiving a highly commended award from the Tourism ExSellence Awards for business tourism.
On top of this, Raymond Blanc’s local hotel, Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons, ranked the highest in the whole of the UK and the No.1 hotel in the UK for food. Many of the UK’s top hotel spas are also clustered in the Cotswolds region near to Oxford Airport, including the Calcot Spa, ranked No. 1 in the UK, The Spa at Barnsley House, ranked No.3 and C-side at Cowley Manor at No. 6. The infamous Cliveden hotel and spa at No.7 is only 35 minutes away.
Although usually recognised world-wide as a classic university city with its academic origins spanning almost a thousand years, last year it was named as 'Britain's Sexiest City 2006' by nearly 200,000 voters in the annual Railcard inspired award. Perhaps there’s a little more to Oxford than academic excellence, Inspector Morse and those 'Dreaming Spires'.
Oxford has also been nominated as the 6th best city in the UK in which to dine by the "Which? Good Food Guide 2007". There were 11 Oxford restaurants mentioned in the guide and Oxford ranked top in terms of city size, against London, Manchester, Edinburgh, Leeds and Glasgow. With well over 100 bars, clubs and restaurants to choose from in the city centre, it’s no surprise Oxford is a hub of cultural and gastronomic excellence.
Accordingly, Oxford has continued recognition once again as being one of the most vibrant and exciting cities in the UK, either to work in or just to visit.
Some other facts highlight the ever-growing popularity of the city - it sees the 3rd highest number of international visitors in England (outside of London), some 10 million visitors overall, making over 9.6 million night stays and spending over 1.45 billion dollars. The region within an hour's drive of Oxford sees more overseas staying visits than the whole of Scotland and Wales put together. Every day 40,000 people commute into the city.
Last year, some 700,000 people saw the grounds of Blenheim Palace, just 1.5 miles from Oxford Airport and over 3.5 million visited the Bicester Village designer retail outlet just 10 minutes away.
Centred amongst the prime southern UK tourist destinations outside of London, including Bath, the Cotswolds, Stratford Upon Avon, Warwick and Windsor, Oxford is better placed than almost any other UK destination outside of London to host visitors to the UK for trips of any duration.
Hotels such as the new Malmaison at the newly restored Oxford Castle area epitomise the new Oxford scene, ranking as one of highest 'Hot List' positions for UK hotels by CN Traveller magazine and routinely winning the Hotel Group of the Year awards for the last four years. Staying in one of the original prison cells (as filmed in the original 'Italian Job' and the classic ‘Porridge’ series), is a unique experience! The famous Randolph Hotel in central Oxford has been upgraded from four to five stars in the last year whilst its parent, McDonalds Hotels won the award for AA hotel group of the year 2007-2008.. The Old Bank Hotel in the city was one of the top 10 converted hotels in Europe.
For aviators and aircraft owners looking for an excuse to fly through Oxford Airport, there have never been as many as there are today.
For enquiries on making a visit, call us at +44 (0)1865 290 710 for advice on how best to make your time here, no matter how fleeting a visit.
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