Oxford

: The Grand Account :

Oxford wears nine centuries of scholarship without ceremony. Matthew Arnold's 'dreaming spires' still hold the skyline; beneath them, the colleges keep their quadrangles, their tutorials, their evensongs, much as they have since the medieval schools first gathered here. This is a city of doors, most closed, the best opened quietly by the right introduction. Prime ministers, laureates and kings have walked these cloisters as undergraduates, which is perhaps why the world's most accomplished visitors feel a particular pull: Oxford is one of the few places that remains genuinely unimpressed by them. Its beauty is real, but its true luxury is seriousness.

The drive is simple and swift: the M40 out of London to Junction 8, then the A40 over the Chilterns escarpment, the view from the Stokenchurch Gap is the journey's overture, and into Oxford within an hour and a half. For a family or a party with advisers, the V-Class VIP Senzati offers a private salon in motion: facing seats, screens, quiet. Oxford's centre is largely closed to traffic, so the chauffeur's craft matters here, permitted set-down points near Broad Street, timings agreed with college porters, the car never more than a message away while you walk the cobbles unaccompanied.

Arrange a private visit to the Bodleian's Divinity School and Duke Humfrey's Library for the morning, then walk Christ Church Meadow while the rowers are out on the Isis. The Ashmolean rewards a quiet hour before lunch. The day's principal pleasure lies twenty minutes east: Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons at Great Milton, Raymond Blanc's manor house, where luncheon can absorb an entire afternoon. Return to the city for choral evensong, New College or Magdalen, around six o'clock in term, sung as it has been for five hundred years. Leave as the lamps come on along the High. Oxford keeps its composure; so shall you.