The Chilterns and the Thames Valley: Local, Characterful Guides to Britain’s Special Places

Part of Bradt’s distinctive, award-winning series of ’Slow’ travel guides to UK regions, the new, thoroughly updated second edition of The Chilterns and Thames Valley (Slow Travel) celebrates this charming, popular English region near London. Written with intimate detail and insider tips by two locals, it is the only guidebook to provide in-depth coverage of this region, which is shared between the counties of Bedfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Oxfordshire.
Divided into six user-friendly sections, Bradt’s The Chilterns and Thames Valley lifts the lid on what makes this area so distinctive. Chalk grasslands, beech woods, streams, a world-famous river and wooded valleys provide perfect landscapes for walking - and are easily accessible from London. About half of the region has been designated as a ’National Landscape’ - the closest such designation to London, and justifying this edition’s inclusion of several new walking routes.
Millions of people know the Chilterns via TV and films, as world-famous studios have created murder, mayhem, historical drama and horror here; this is Midsomer Murders country. In the Chilterns you find key sites of monarchical and political power such as Windsor Castle (an official residence of HM King Charles III) and Chequers (the Prime Minister’s country home), and Runnymede (where the Magna Carta was sealed). Many well-loved authors (including T.S. Eliot and Robert Frost) have lived and worked here - depicting Paradise, defining our childhoods and painting timeless images of England and its people. Eminent chefs own restaurants with national, even international, reputations: Bray village alone hosts two of Britain’s eight triple-Michelin-starred restaurants.
The Chilterns and the Thames Valley (plus the Vale of Aylesbury) represent a wonderfully paradoxical mixture of world-famous tourist sites and lesser-known yet quirky and characterful attractions, which will deeply reward the visitor. From Windsor Castle to Whipsnade Zoo, Britain’s oldest road (The Ridgeway) to National Trust properties such as Cliveden and Waddesdon, the Henley Regatta to the Grand Union Canal, from Jordans village (the burial place of Pennsylvania founder William Penn) to Runnymede’s Kennedy Memorial, Bradt’s The Chilterns and Thames Valley (Slow Travel) is your perfect travelling companion to this enchanting area.

Helen and Neil Matthews (slowchilterns.com) have lived in the village of Prestwood, in the heart of the Chilterns, for more than 30 years. Helen is Chilterns born and bred: her family ties to the area can be traced back for centuries. She is the Chair (and a founder member) of a local conservation charity and a member of the Chiltern Society’s Heritage Group. Neil’s 25 years in marketing includes stints with local charities in Aylesbury and Saunderton. As well as writing both editions of Bradt’s The Chilterns and the Thames Valley (Slow Travel), Helen and Neil have also written Bradt’s Heritage Weekends: 52 Breaks Exploring Britain’s Past and updated Bradt’s Freedom Pass London. Both hold PhDs in history. Pen & Sword published Helen’s The Legitimacy of Bastards: the Place of Illegitimate Children in Later Medieval England (2019) and Neil’s Victorians and Edwardians Abroad: the Beginning of the Modern Holiday (2016).