Lady’s Guide to a Day Trip to Windsor and Eton

Today I want to share my guide to taking a day trip to Windsor and Eton. Windsor Castle is one of the most famous castles near London, and Eton College is one of the most renowned boys’ boarding schools in the UK. Given they’re next door to one another, it’s worth a trip to see these bastions of Britishness.

Day Trip to Windsor and Eton

On Thursday I made my way to Paddington station and took the train to Windsor.

My mother told me we took a day trip to Windsor and Eton when I was five, so I arrived in Berkshire curious to find out whether my childhood memories would come flooding back.

They didn’t. It was just as well, though, because I love to explore new places.

I alighted from the train and made my way through the shopping arcade (very American of them to put a shopping mall between the train station and the main attraction!) to find myself face to face with the sprawling expanse of Windsor Castle.

Windsor Castle

I’m kind of a sucker for medieval architecture, alternately picturing myself in a turret shooting a crossbow at enemy invaders and donning a fancy gown to sit for a state dinner with my knights. Medieval Me is quite the Renaissance woman.

I walked up to the castle entrance where the kind lady at the ticket booth extracted my pound of flesh, sent me through a metal detector, then let me loose to explore the grounds.

Armed with my audioguide, I walked along the castle walls, past the Round Tower, through St. George’s Chapel, and into the State Apartments.

There I saw the shocking display of opulence that is Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House (you could feed the population of a developing country for at least a year with the money that was spent on those dolls–none of whom were present, curiously. Perhaps they spend their winters elsewhere.).

I continued through the Drawings Gallery and into the State Apartments, which were decorated with all the usual gilded pomp and circumstance.

Eton

My visit to Windsor Castle finished, I continued my day trip to Windsor and Eton by wandering across the River Thames to Eton, the neighboring town and home to the famous college of the same name.

I arrived in time to see a few tour groups starting their slow walks through the grounds. My penchant for people-watching went into overdrive as I inspected all the families in the clusters.

There were the fathers in their double-breasted suits with orange pocket squares poking their sons in the ribs if they made the slightest misstep.

Beside them stood carelessly elegant mothers busy making sure no other mother was careful enough to be more elegant.

Nearby there were fathers in suits and ties, with sons dressed to match. Every time the tour guide turned around they busied themselves straightening their sons’ hair and looking hopefully at their wives.

No tour group would be complete without the twin boys in their matching school cardigans, little sister in tow. Their parents seemed more concerned about keeping the family together than about listening to the guide.

I turned down a side road in Eton and meandered through some outdoor sports facilities where young Etonians were playing some sort of handball game in dreary-looking cement cubicles (I later learned it’s an official game called Eton Fives).

I walked by dormitory buildings, a chapel, and a music hall before turning back to the high street. There were students everywhere, some running to sports practice, others walking self-importantly in their coats and tails.

Being conspicuously female and ‘slightly’ older than anyone else in the vicinity, I started feeling frighteningly aged and out of place. It was time for my day trip to Windsor and Eton to end. 

Day Out in Windsor and Eton

I meandered back to the train station and took one last look at Windsor Castle and Eton before heading home to London.

It was nice to have revisited them both. Even though my childhood memories didn’t come back, I know my adult ones will stay with me. If you get a chance to take a day trip to Windsor and Eton, I hope the same is true for you.

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