1. Clue HQ Swindon
We are inside Laser Quest at Shaw Ridge Leisure Park on Whitehill Way, with plenty of free parking and food and a cinema on the same site. Four escape rooms, sixty minutes, private to your group.
We would say that, of course. Everything below is what our games hosts actually recommend when people ask what else there is to do.
2. STEAM, Museum of the Great Western Railway
In a restored building inside the old railway works that built the town, across from the Designer Outlet. It is about the people who built and ran the Great Western as much as the engines, and the locomotives you can walk up to are enormous.
3. Lydiard Park
Two hundred and sixty acres of parkland three miles west of the centre, free to walk around, with a Palladian house you can tour, a walled garden and a café looking out over the grounds.
4. Coate Water Country Park
A reservoir turned nature reserve on the edge of town: a big lake, woodland and meadows, a splash park and playground in summer, and the art deco diving platform still standing at the water’s edge.
5. Old Town
The part of Swindon people forget about, up the hill from the centre. Independent restaurants, pubs and live music along Wood Street and Devizes Road, and the free museum and art gallery nearby.
Before you go
Opening times, prices and menus change, so check with each place before you travel, especially out of season. Our own games are advance booking only, so book your slot first and build the rest of the day around it.