The Local Area
As a visitor it is easy to spend a full day just walking around Cirencester. You can buy a little leaflet from the Tourist Information Office in the market square titled "Cirencester - a town walk", published by the Cirencester Civic Society. It was very cheap and took us to places we would never have found, pointing out architectural and historical details.
As special points of interest you might like to visit the following:
- Corinium Museum .
- Cirencester Park . This 10,000 acre park is part of the estate of Lord Bathurst, and sections are open to the public on foot and horseback, so remember to bring your horse with you - the park is too vast to explore on foot. We walked 50 yards from the entrance and turned back! The park can be reached via Cecily Hill , which is worth seeing in its own right.
- Surviving portions of the hospital of St. John the Evangelist, founded in 1133 by Henry I.
- The abbey park and gatehouse.
- The Roman wall and amphitheatre.
- The open air swimming pool.
- The church of St. John the Baptist.
- Brewery Arts Centre , Cirencester
Cirencester is at the heart of the Cotswolds, and forms a good base for exploration - any town or village can by reached in at most 30 minutes by car. The Roman street plan may have gone, but Roman roads like the Fosse Way and Ermine Street radiate from Corineum (Cirencester) like spokes from a wheel-hub. Here are some of those attractive destinations.
• Cotswold Water Park , over 130 lakes covering over 40 square miles
• Cotswold Wildlife Park , near Burford
• Birdland , Bourton-on-the-Water