Cambridge is a perfect day trip from London.
The city has its own aesthetic, which I can easily describe as magical, with the historic colleges, the boats on the river, and the atmosphere of student life.
It’s only about an hour by train from London and the city centre is small and walkable, so you can see many of the highlights in Cambridge in one day.
In this guide I share a plan for a beautiful day trip from London to Cambridge you can follow.
Table of contents
What to do in Cambridge on a day trip
On a Cambridge day trip you can cover many of the best things to do in Cambridge and the city’s most quintessential activities.
You won’t be able to see everything, but you can see a lot, thanks to the compact size of the city centre.
Before we move on to the day trip itinerary, here’s a quick overview of the top things to do in Cambridge on one day:
- A guided walking tour
- King’s College Chapel
- Cambridge Market, indie shops, and bookshops
- Wander charming little streets around the centre
- Fitzwilliam Museum
- Punting tour
Cambridge day trip itinerary
Here’s an itinerary for a full day in Cambridge, arriving from London by train.
Arriving in Cambridge
When you arrive at Cambridge railway station, you’re just a short walk away from the city centre. It takes about 15 minutes.
You can also take a bus from the railway station, but I found it was faster to walk rather than wait for a bus.
Cambridge tour and King’s College Chapel
The best way to get to know a city on a day trip is with a local guide.
Start your Cambridge visit with a guided tour.
The tour helped me with orientation and covered a lot of the history and highlights of the city.
It was different to tours I’ve taken in other cities because our guide was a Cambridge University graduate.
In the group I joined, everyone was very curious about student life in Cambridge.
We all had questions for our guide and he was happy to share his own personal experience.
We found out what college life is like through his own stories and those of his friends. That was a lovely bonus and certainly different to ordinary city tours.
We saw the major sights, learnt about famous people who went to Cambridge, and were amused by some quirky historical anecdotes about the colleges.
After taking this tour, you’ll have seen the well-known colleges in the city centre, the Backs, the Mathematical Bridge, and quite a few other places worth seeing in Cambridge.
As an alternative to a walking tour, you can take the local sightseeing bus. It’s a hop-on/hop-off, open-top bus with an audio guide.
I personally wanted to tour with a live guide for the interaction, so I picked a walking tour, but the bus does have some great advantages.
The main advantage is that you can reach more places around the city. The bus tour has 18 stops which include all the highlights you’d see on a walking tour, plus a few more that are a bit farther away.
The other advantage is that you can hear the audio commentary in 9 languages.
Whether you take a walking tour or a bus tour, I recommend you visit the magnificent King’s College Chapel after the tour.
King’s College Chapel
King’s College Chapel is probably the most popular place to see in Cambridge. It is gorgeous inside and well worth a visit.
When you sign up for the walking tour, you can select adding King’s College Chapel to your booking.
The price is the same as the normal chapel ticket, but it saves you a bit of time on making separate bookings when you plan this day trip.
The visit to the chapel itself is self-guided, after the guided walking tour ends.
I enjoyed visiting King’s College Chapel, it was just as awe inspiring as I’d expected.
If you love design and architecture, you’ll appreciate all the small design details in the stained glass, the oak screen, and of course the ceiling.
If you love history, check out the exhibitions in the side chapels.
The chapel is large and spacious, so it didn’t feel crowded when I was there, even though there were a lot of other people around.
Wander around the lovely city centre
After the guided tour and the visit to King’s College Chapel, you’ll be in the city centre, close to the market square.
Cambridge’s market runs most days in this central square and is worth a wander even if you’re not buying anything.
The surrounding streets have a nice mix of cafés, restaurants, and places to buy Cambridge souvenirs. You’ll see all the usual British high street shops but also various indie shops.
At this point in your day trip, you can stop for lunch around there, there’s plenty of choice.
If you want to take some unique photos of Cambridge, wander into side streets to discover some more picturesque alleys that are great for photos, especially Green Street, Rose Crescent, Senate House Passage, and Trinity Lane.
I enjoyed taking my time shooting photos of these beautiful little streets.
If you love books, allow extra time to browse the many bookshops in the city centre, especially Heffers.
Fitzwilliam Museum
After lunch and wandering the lovely streets in the centre, walk about 10 minutes to the Fitzwilliam Museum, a famous Cambridge institution.
It has such diverse exhibitions that anyone can find something of interest there: antiquities, fine art paintings by famous artists, ancient Egyptian mummies, ceramics, and even some contemporary art.
I found the curation there very interesting, with themed rooms that lead you through a story or a motif.
The building itself is gorgeous and part of the experience.
Fitzwilliam Museum is free to enter. Check opening hours here.
Punting on the River Cam
End your day trip to Cambridge with the activity Cambridge is famous for: Punting.
What is Punting?
Sitting in a flat wooden boat, pushed by a long pole against the river bed to glide along.
On the River Cam that runs through Cambridge, you drift past ancient colleges and under old bridges. It’s a slow and peaceful experience.
One of the most famous places in Cambridge, the Bridge of Sighs, can only be seen when punting on the river, or by entering St John’s college.
The entrance fee to the college is close to the price of a punting tour. I think punting gives you a more unique experience.
How to go punting in Cambridge
You can go punting with or without a guide, either privately or in a group.
I recommend you book this activity in advance if you travel in high season or during the weekend, because prices for punting tours can go up on days when there’s a lot of demand.
Here are your options:
- A shared punting tour: This is the best option if you have no experience and want to enjoy a relaxed river tour. Your guide does the steering while you sit back and enjoy.
- A private punting tour: A punting tour for you and your party only. A good choice for families or a group of friends sharing the punt.
- A self-hire: You can hire a punt and do the steering yourself. I must say it’s not as easy as it looks. I’ve watched many people with no experience trying to steer the punt and bumping into other punts or into walls…
- It’s not the best idea for a fun day trip if you haven’t done it before.
- If you do decide to go for it, allow extra time for the learning curve.
Wrapping up this Cambridge day trip
At this point in your day trip you can have dinner at any of the many cafes and restaurants in Cambridge city centre, or have a drink at one of the pubs around there.
Then head back to the railway station. Allow about 15 minutes or more to reach the station from the centre (or hop on a bus).
Alternative: Visiting Oxford and Cambridge on a day trip from London
If you’d like to see both Oxford and Cambridge, you can join a group tour that takes you to both cities in one day.
Normally I’d recommend taking your time rather than rushing through these cities.
However, if you’re really short on time on your trip to England and want to see as much as possible, this is a good option.
It’s also a good idea to join this tour if you don’t want to take care of the logistics of planning a day trip yourself.
The tour provider takes care of comfortable bus transfers, guided tours in each city, checking opening times, covering the highlights, and so on.
You’ll still have some free time to visit what you’d like to see in each city, like a college or a museum. You can also choose to add entry tickets to main attractions when you make your booking (Christ Church College and King’s College Chapel).
How to get to Cambridge from London
The easiest way to get to Cambridge from London is by train.
- From King Cross Station in London it takes only 50 minutes to reach Cambridge on the fastest direct train.
- From Liverpool Street Station it takes about 1 hour and 15 minutes.
- Train stop at several other stations in London, so search for the one closest to you.
Make sure you get off at Cambridge station and not at Cambridge South station.
I recommend you book an off-peak day return ticket, meaning you leave London after rush hour in the morning and return after rush hour in the evening.
Prices go up as you get closer to your date of travel (that’s normal in the UK), so best book the train as soon as you know your travel date.
You can also travel to Cambridge from London by bus (I haven’t tried it but it takes over an hour).
Is Cambridge worth visiting on a day trip from London?
Cambridge is a perfect day out from London for many reasons:
- A short train ride: It only takes about an hour to reach Cambridge from London on a direct train, so you’re not wasting too much time on going there and getting back.
- Plenty to do and see: There’s a lot to do in Cambridge and you can fit quite a few of its most famous attractions and activities into one day.
- A compact and walkable city centre: Everything in the city centre is within walking distance, including the colleges, the market, museums, places to eat, shops, the river, and so on.
- A relaxing day out of London: Cambridge is smaller and quieter than central London. The charm of the old colleges and the boats on the river make it very peaceful and picturesque.
- The unique colleges: Cambridge has some wonderful architecture and a very unique atmosphere thanks to its colleges.
- Punting on the River Cam: The quintessential Cambridge activity that’s fun to watch and great to take part in yourself.
Have you taken a day trip to Cambridge from London? Share your experience in the comments below.
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