Elliott Brown from Birmingham, United Kingdom, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
- Families
- No car
A day out with children in Banbury: parks, birds and a canal, on foot
A free day in Banbury for families with younger children: the aviary and play area at People's Park, the Cross and the rhyme, the museum and a canalside lunch, and the play area at Spiceball. On foot from Tuesday to Saturday, with a plan for rain.
- 1 day
- Best Tuesday to Saturday
- On foot, or park at one end
- Free apart from food
- About 2 miles (3km) walking
A day in Banbury with children
Day 1 · Birds and swings in the morning, a rhyme and a museum at midday, a play area by the canal after lunch
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10am
10am 1 hour here
People's Park: aviary and play area
Main entrance on Warwick Road. Budgies and cockatiels in the aviary, then the children's play area. Free. The toilets, with baby changing, are in the walled garden, and the café usually opens 8am to 6pm.
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11am
11am On foot
To the Fine Lady and Banbury Cross
About 10 minutes on foot. Say the rhyme at the statue at South Bar: she has rings on her fingers and bells on her toes. The Cross is a minute on, and busy with traffic, so hold hands at the junction.
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11.30am
11.30am On foot
Down the High Street to the museum
About 15 minutes at a small child's pace, by the Market Place on Thursdays and Saturdays. The museum has an entrance in Castle Quay.
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11.45am
11.45am Things to do 45 minutes here
Banbury Museum and Gallery
Free, 10am to 4pm Monday to Saturday (2026), with a lift to all floors and baby changing on each. Ask at the desk what is on for children that day. Touring exhibitions cost extra.
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12.30pm
12.30pm Things to do 45 minutes here
Lunch at Gwen's Canalside Café
In the museum building. Open Tuesday to Saturday, 10am to 4pm, and Sunday, 11am to 3pm (2026). It lists no Monday hours, so on a Monday eat at People's Park first.
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1.15pm
1.15pm Things to do 15 minutes here
Tooley's Boatyard, from outside
Next to the museum. See the working dry dock and the narrowboats from the towpath. On Saturdays through the summer the trust runs public trips on its boat, the Dancing Duck, which takes up to 12: look at its page and book ahead.
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1.30pm
1.30pm On foot
The towpath to Spiceball Country Park
A few minutes north along the canal, with water on one side, so reins or hands for the youngest. The park's main entrance is off Cherwell Drive.
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1.45pm
1.45pm 1.5 hours here
Spiceball's play area
Skate ramps are near the play area, and there is a cycle track. Cross the wooden bridges for nature trails on the wild side. No café or toilets on the council's page, so go before you leave the museum.
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3.30pm
3.30pm On foot
Back to the station or the car
About 15 minutes on foot to Banbury station. The paid Riverside car park on Cherwell Drive is beside the park, and the Waterworks car park on Grimsbury Green, free for park users, is across the bridges.
In more detail
Banbury has two good parks at opposite ends of the town centre, a free museum between them, and the most famous nursery rhyme in the country to hang the day on. That makes it an easy and cheap day with younger children, and you can do it all on foot. It is about 2 miles (3km), by our estimate from the distances, which a five-year-old can manage with stops. Nobody from this guide has done it with children for this page, so judge the times against your own.
Which day, and how old
This route suits children up to about 10. Older ones will want the skate ramps at Spiceball and little else. Come from Tuesday to Saturday, when Gwen's Canalside Café is open, and on a Saturday in summer if you want a boat trip from Tooley's (opens in a new tab). The trust does not give times or fares on its page, so look before you plan the morning. Sundays work with a late start, because the museum opens from 11am to 3pm, and Gwen's serves a roast.
How to use the day
Start at People's Park because the morning is when small children have energy for a play area, and because the park has what you need: a café, toilets and baby changing. Next comes the Fine Lady, a bronze of the lady on her horse at a road junction, then Banbury Cross. Keep it short. Both are seen from the pavement and the junction is busy. There is a longer story, but the rhyme is enough for most under-sevens.
The museum calls itself family friendly and has a lift to all floors and baby changing on each, but we could not find a list of its children's activities. Ask at the desk, or ring 01295 236165. The Waterways gallery and the Wardington carrier's cart are the things most likely to hold a small child. Go on after lunch to look at the boats at Tooley's, and then the towpath leads to Spiceball and the second play area.
Getting there
Banbury station has lifts to all platforms and is about five minutes' walk from the Town Hall. If you drive, park at one end and walk to the other: parking in Banbury compares the choices. The Waterworks car park on Grimsbury Green, OX16 3JJ, is free for park users, which suits a day that ends at Spiceball. In that case, do the route the other way round, and finish with the aviary.
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If it rains
Skip the parks and shift the weight to indoors. The museum can take a good hour or more, and lunch at Gwen's is under the same roof. Good Game on the High Street calls itself Banbury's first board game café, and reviews on its site say the owners explain the rules, which suits children old enough to play by them. Its site prints no hours, and in November 2026 Google Maps showed it opening at 4pm on a Thursday, so check its booking page before you plan around it. A pantomime fills a winter day: Chipping Norton Theatre's The Snow Queen runs from 18 November 2026 to 17 January 2027, about 13 miles away by road.
What to skip
St Mary's had no opening hours we could find and is not one for small children. Castle Quay is shops, so treat it as a dry way through. And we found nobody in Banbury selling Banbury cakes when we checked in November 2026, so do not promise one. If you have promised, the recipe makes a good job for a wet afternoon at home.
With a car and a second day
Burton Dassett Hills is a hundred acres of open hilltop for £3.50 a car, with no surfaced routes and toilets only from 9am to 3pm. Upton House charges £9 for a child and £45 for a family with two adults (2026), but its lower garden has steep drops, so watch small children closely. Sulgrave Manor is closed for the winter and reopens in March 2027, so it is one for spring. For more, see day trips from Banbury.