Far from being somewhere to pass through on the way to the south west’s coastal counties, Wiltshire is an attraction-packed destination in its own right
The gateway to the South West is Wiltshire, a county of hidden gems.
Everyone knows about Stonehenge, and Wiltshire is one of the country’s most-visited counties thanks to this major international draw. But there’s so much more to see, and some of it is as yet undiscovered by groups. ‘Hidden secrets’ was the theme of a packed-itinerary fam with Visit Wiltshire.
Studley Grange
Our first stop was Studley Grange Butterfly World & Craft Village, a little gem of a place, where we were served tea, coffee and its own homemade cakes. The butterfly park comprises a tropical hothouse bursting with gorgeous butterflies, some as large as your hand. There's also a reptile house and small zoo. Studley Grange is a small, family-run enterprise with a strong emphasis on education.
The craft village is another major draw: A dozen or so unique shops that you won't find anywhere else, selling pottery, quilting, doll's houses (the writer had to be dragged away), chocolates (the smell!) and art, with workshops and activities happening all the time. The activities include decorating cakes, drawing and making cards, and you can pre-book your groups or just drop in.
There's a large soft play area filled with families, and the whole atmosphere is of homely contentment.
Studley Grange is two years through a five-year upgrade, and once complete it's unlikely to stay a hidden gem.
There's plenty of free coach parking, and group bookings are tailor-made. Call Jackie to discuss your requirements.
Wyvern Theatre
While in Swindon your groups may enjoy a trip to the theatre, and the Wyvern Theatre and Arts Centre between them offer a good variety of national and locally-produced shows, plus a homegrown annual panto.
The '70s-era theatre is owned (but not managed) by the council, and is sadly a little run-down, but the auditorium is pleasant and there's a long-term plan to convert this part of the town into Swindon's cultural quarter.
Groups are well looked after at the Wyvern, with good coach parking nearby, discounts for groups of eight-plus, one contact to take care of your booking, and hospitality packages on offer. The theatre will work with you, and shows – including the panto – can be booked up to a year in advance.
STEAM and McArthurGlen
Our next port of call was Swindon’s old railway works, which has been converted into the town’s two premier attractions: STEAM, the impressive Great Western Railway museum, and the McArthurGlen designer outlet shopping centre.
STEAM takes visitors through the nostalgic journey of the historic railway – from the genius minds of such figures as Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Daniel Gooch, to the operational functions of the Swindon Works, to the social revolution the railways brought to the way people spend their free time. This latter part of the museum is one of its most fascinating. Railways truly signalled the dawn of holidays for British people, and changed the way we travel forever.
The museum is modern and slick, and recent interest around the Great Western Railway – particularly thanks to the 175th anniversary of the Works and First Great Western's rebrand – have helped to put it on the map.
Just a short walk away, the McArthurGlen shopping destination has filled the empty buildings with high-quality, vibrant designer outlet shopping. There's loads of it, and it's excellent – names like Kurt Geiger, Ted Baker, Le Creuset and Lacoste – plus large Next and M&S outlets – all undercover and in a fascinating historical setting, with railway-related artefacts and information plaques to see. We ate in the Carluccio's on-site, which is well geared up for groups.
Avebury
An excellent, lesser-known alternative to Stonehenge is Avebury stone circle, which dates from 2850-2200BC and covers a larger area – an almost perfect circle of stones and steep banks. Here you can actually wander up and touch the stones, and as you do, perhaps fancy you can feel those thousands of years of history coursing through your fingers.
As well as the stones themselves, a visit offers up 16th-century Avebury Manor, an immersive stately home; a museum, where you can find out more about the famous henge; and the picturesque village of Avebury itself. The stones, the manor and the museum are all National Trust, and a five-minute walk from the car park, which has ample space for coaches. The stones are a short distance away, and ideal for groups to take at their own pace: You can look at a few of them, or take a long walk around the entire circle.
Either way, there's enough here to keep groups busy for at least half a day.
Visit Wiltshire is currently promoting the A4, which runs past Avebury – in the pipeline is a new initiative called the Great West Way, a tourism route from London-Bristol. It's geared towards international visitors, but it does highlight for UK visitors that this is a very scenic road, and it's perfect for driving a coach along.
Corsham
Wiltshire is the gateway to the south west in more ways than one. Our next stop is Corsham, which has been put on the map thanks to it doubling up as 18th century Truro for the hit BBC show Poldark.
It's a simply beautiful small town, with a wealth of unspoilt Georgian buildings and a quaint independent shopping scene.
Our coach drops us off next to the beautiful Almshouses, and we walk through the trees towards Corsham Court, owned by the Methuen family, and now used as part of Bath Spa University. It's open 100 days a year, and it's worth booking in a group tour on one of those – not just the gardens, but some of the interiors, were designed by Capability Brown.
We turned off down Church Street and emerged in a filming location: The picturesque high street, crowned by the Town Hall and the Flemish Weaver pub (aka the Red Lion in Poldark).
The Town Hall happily welcomes groups with a toilet stop, hot drinks and biscuits, and has a photo exhibition on Poldark's filming. Maps are handed out for members of the group to explore the lovely little town, easily covered on foot, and we recommend going on a day that isn't Sunday, and making the most of the lovely shops.
There are events in Corsham – including a "festival fortnight" of arts, walking and food and drink – and productions throughout the year at the Arts Centre.
American Museum in Britain
In many ways the Jazz Age of the 1920s paved the way for our modern culture. The end of the First World War heralded new fashions, new novels, and innovations in movies and music that led directly to how we see the world today. The period is also seeing something of a revival now.
The American Museum in Britain is showing an exhibition on the jazz age from now until the end of October, and it's wholly worth seeing. It presents women's fashions of the time along with movies and books.
The Museum itself is truly arresting. For Britons who have grown up with American culture but without its history, it offers a fantastic whistle-stop tour through the American way – and focuses on the decorative and folk art of the country.
We had lunch at the quaint, crooked Bridge Tea Rooms in Bradford. It's pleasant but perhaps a little pricey, and not very well geared up for groups – smaller groups will probably fare better.
Iford Manor
Then it was on to the incredible gardens of Iford Manor. These gardens are art. They're the work of aesthete Harold Peto, who in 1899 landed at Iford – an old Roman wool site, and a place of continual industrial occupation since then – and chose it as the place to build his Italian vision.
The old mill and factory buildings had already been remodelled to look like a classic Bath mansion, and had the word 'manor' slapped on them. Peto's artistry was channelled into the gardens. He cleared the steep hillside of trees and built stunning terraces, linked by staircases, in a style that today's owner William Cartwright-Hignett describes as "formal-informal – or smart casual.”
William also refers to "not illusions – but allusions" in the gardens: Peto was a clever man, and created impressions throughout. For example, one terrace was once the site of the factory chapel: This garden has been given ecclesiastical hints through font-like ornaments.
There's also the Cloisters, a Roman-inspired temple that Peto built to house his collection of bits and pieces of old Italian architecture, and is now often used as a performance space.
Spanish, Italianate and Japanese gardens are found. The Japanese garden, right near the top of the hill, was never finished by Peto thanks to the logistics of getting water up a hill. But this has been skilfully achieved in recent years by William’s father John.
The Cartwright-Hignetts have been working to restore Iford for years, and William and John give excellent guided tours. William is chockful of enthusiasm and insists his dad is more so.
Groups are wholly welcomed, the doors thrown open for them for out-of-season visits, when they exclusively have the run of the place. Access is tight, but our talented Pewsey Vale Coaches driver managed it in a 12-metre coach.
The GTOs on our trip raved and gave it 10s or 11s out of 10. Your groups will not be disappointed – especially if the wisteria is in flower.
Longleat
You've probably been to a few stately homes in your time, and had the guided tour. But at Longleat they do things a bit differently – and I'm not sure they even mean to.
We didn't have much time to explore this fantastic house, but instead of feeling we were being chivvied along, our guide gave off the air that we were friends of the family and she was casually showing the house off to us. She opened doors, took us through servants' corridors, whisked us up stairs, switched lights on and off for us, and really gave us a feel for the house as a whole – not just as a series of state rooms.
First she showed us Lord Bath's murals. Since he was in his 20s, the seventh Marquess of Bath has been creating the most fantastic, vibrant artworks in over a dozen rooms of the house. The elegant proportions of a Georgian mansion, but with vivid, 3D modern paintings, bold coloured fixtures and fittings, and glass mosaic ceilings based on the stately Victorian ceilings above. If you've never been to Longleat before, you've never seen anything like it.
Then we took a whistle-stop tour of the state rooms, including some of its libraries (at 44,000 books, Longleat has the biggest private collection in Europe), its dining rooms, and opulent drawing room. The Green Library is a favourite – often reserved for VIP groups, but a really gorgeous and cosy room. Some of these rooms were remodelled in Victorian times with ceilings made of gold with priceless, ancient paintings cast into them.
Then we had a quick look upstairs – or should that be 'downstairs' – at the servants' quarters, including the rather spooky 'coffin corridor'.
We saw Longleat's banqueting suite – isn't it lovely to see old houses with modern decor? They're even decorated with Lord Bath's colourful modern paintings of the kings and queens of England.
Groups can sometimes get access to the Minstrel's Gallery above the Great Hall, the only part of the house that still has its original Elizabethan decor, which is a lovely place to be.
We finished by gliding down the grand central staircase, elegantly topped with a lantern.
We didn't even touch on the gardens, of the safari park, but Longleat is easily worth a whole day.
Groups are very welcome at Longleat, and our guide urges us to remind drivers to drop off right in front of the house.
It's expanding its range of group tours. The House & History basic tour takes an hour, and can usually be combined with a tour of the mural rooms (but this can't be guaranteed, as the Baths still use them sometimes). The Butlers & Servants tour is quite a new one, and not suitable for all groups because it accesses the upper floors via stairs, and the corridors are narrow – but it's very popular nonetheless.
New for 2017 is the Scandalous tour, focusing on gossip and scandal around the house's inhabitants, and using portraits in the rooms.
The Capability Brown tour requires lots of walking; and there are also rooftop tours, which sadly can't be pre-booked because they’re weather-dependent.
Educational tours can be tailored to your group, so just ask if your group are particularly interested in furniture, architecture, the First World War, etc.
Longleat's Festival of Light has become a hugely popular draw around Christmas, and has gained an extra week this year, opening at the beginning of November.
Longleat was built in the 1500s by John Thynne, a commoner who made good. His family became the marquises of Bath and their story and personalities are dashed through the house – not least in the current Lord Bath's paintings. It's a wonderful place to visit.
Salisbury Cathedral
Salisbury Cathedral is an unusual one. Unlike most cathedrals it was built all at once, in just 38 years, on a site that was previously empty.
And apart from its famously tall spire, which came in the 1320s, it has had no major additions. It's a complete 13th century cathedral, with uniform Early English Gothic proportions and beauty.
Groups are very welcome, with guided tours and bespoke packages. Tower Tours are also available – or an easier and quicker alternative is to climb the 60 steps to the great West Window, the only part to still have original 13th century stained glass, and look out and down through the nave to the east window. That's one of the lovely things about Salisbury Cathedral: You can stand at one end and see all the way to the other.
On a guided tour, notable items include the world's oldest mechanical clock; the simply beautiful William Pye font, installed in 2008, with its four fountains and perfectly still surface; the Prisoners of Conscience Window; original 13th century miserichords; and a splendid carved glass prism by Sir Laurence Whistler, commemorating his brother, the artist Rex Whistler, who died in the Second World War.
Salisbury Cathedral also has the best-preserved Magna Carta.
The pick-up and drop-off point is a 10-minute walk from the entrance, through Cathedral Close.
Mompesson House
Also in the Close is Mompesson House, a National Trust property and one-time home of the Bishops of Salisbury.
It was built in the 18th century and hasn't been changed a great deal since. Groups can spend an hour wandering at leisure through the splendid Georgian rooms, with their elaborate plasterwork and 18th century furnishings, and learn about the owners of the house – including Barbara Townsend, an artist, and the last owner Dennis Martineau, who gave it to the Trust.
The library has been retained in 1950s style, and it's fairly easy to imagine living here, painting watercolours of the magnificent cathedral across the green. The garden is lovely too.
Arundells
We also visited Arundells – Prime Minister Sir Edward Heath's retirement home, where he lived from 1992 till his death at home in 2005.
It's similar in size and design to Mompesson House, but with a completely different feel: Distinctly '90s furniture and decor, a large collection of political photographs and gifts, and Sir Ted's personality and tastes reflected in every room.
The centrepiece of the drawing room, for example, is a beautiful grand piano topped with photographs of political leaders. Sir Ted loved music. The entrance hall is decked out with sailing memorabilia: Paintings of seascapes, sailing trophies, and models of winning yachts, because Sir Ted's great hobby was sailing.
The library downstairs and the study upstairs are both fascinating. Now available to view are Sir Ted's bedroom and en-suite bathroom. There's a conference table in the bedroom – if you want a mawkish tableau of his last moments, you'll happily be disappointed. The whole attraction has been created with a lot of respect for the man.
Guided tours focus on his art collection, which includes work by Lowry, Singer-Sergeant, John Nash and Winston Churchill; his friendships and political relationships, from John Betjeman to Chairman Mao; and his hobbies and interests.
Sir Ted said that being knighted was the happiest time of his life, and groups can see his Order of the Garter and associated banner, and there's also an exhibition on his military career. In an outbuilding there's an exhibition on his life through cartoons.
Guided tours are available Wednesday-Thursday, and free-flow visits on Saturday-Tuesday.
Cholderton and churches
We stopped at Cholderton Rare Breed farm, which has a modern and pleasant cafe and is good for a mealstop – excellent soup and sandwiches, and the chef responded well to compliments by bringing us some extra fresh ham sandwiches.
It has 40 acres and is a lovely place for children, but in future will have more to offer adults: It planted a vineyard 18 months ago, and in about five years group tours of the vineyard will be available.
We then arrived at St Mary's Church of Alton Barnes, a tiny chapel-like edifice, with Saxon origins. This and All Saints Church Alton Priors, a short walk away, are two important and historical members of the Churches Conservation Trust, “the National Trust for churches” which has 350 churches countrywide.
The Trust now offers themed itineraries, cream teas and lunches, and events and activities for groups. Sarah Parker of the Trust's Western branch tells us that whatever a group is interested in – from a certain type of architecture, to the works of Shakespeare – thanks to the wealth of history in every church, a tour can usually be devised around it, so do mention any special interests when planning your tours.
