OXFORD: PRACTICAL MATTERS

First things first: Practical matters. If you're a poor student like me, or a tourist travelling on a budget, it's important to plan your trip or short stay meticulously to avoid overspending and running out of money before your elective/trip is over.

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Travelling to Oxford from London

When I landed in London Heathrow, I stayed over with relatives for the weekend before actually going to Oxford. If you're planning to check out London for a while first, then travel to Oxford, you have the option of 1) taking a train (ca. 1 hour trip) or 2) taking a bus/coach. Travelling to Oxford from London by bus is the cheapest (and actually quite comfortable, especially when you're carrying heavy luggage), and you could do this with three options:

1) OxfordTube: It costs 14 £ with next-day return for students, so always bring your student ID around. Keep the bus ticket and simply show it to the bus driver upon boarding on your return trip. It's even cheaper with 11 £ if you take the trip after 3 p. m. (night rider) including the next-day return trip. Alternatively, if you know (like me) you'll be travelling to London from Oxford and back many times during your stay, you could also buy the 12-trip ticket (valid within one year) which costs about 62 £. Definitely worth it considering that 6x trip with return costs about 6 x 14 = 84 £. Trip comes with free WiFi.

2) X90: This Oxford-London bus costs about the same as OxfordTube, except it isn't a double-decker, and I personally find the seats and aisles narrower than OxfordTube coaches. There's not much difference between OxfordTube and X90, although I found that X90 bus drivers tend to help more with loading luggage onto the bus.

3) The Airline Oxford Bus: If you're travelling directly from and toward the Heathrow/Gatwick airports, it might be more convenient to take this bus. Oxford to Heathrow costs about 23 £ for single trip, 25 £ with return ticket.

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Travelling around Oxford

If you're going to be in Oxford for at least 4 weeks and plan to sightseeing, I cannot emphasise enough the need to buy a monthly bus pass for the convenience as well as the amount of money you'd save. A single trip with return costs about 3 £, so assuming you would make at least one trip to the city centre and back to your accommodation per day, that would cost about 3 x 30 = 90 £ per month. The SmartZone bus pass covers most of Oxford including Cowley and Headington, and costs about 54. 50 £ per 4 weeks. You can see how much it saves you not only the hassle of having to fish out coins from your purse while buying your ticket from the bus driver and holding up the bus from continuing its journey, you'd also save almost 50% of what you'd spend by buying a ticket each trip.

You could buy the bus pass personally at Debenhams (at the junction of George Street and Cornmarket Street) on the third floor. From my own experience, the receptionists there have always been generally quite pleasant and friendly and willing to advise which pass would suit your stay the best. Or alternatively, you could buy them online.

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Accommodation in Oxford

I got an Airbnb accommodation which is on hindsight a very bad idea. Most people including myself have had very pleasant or uneventful experiences with Airbnb, but I think it really depends on what you're staying in Oxford for. If you're a tourist spending less than a week in Oxford, and you don't know too many locals in the city, then by all means.

However, if you're a student who would be staying for more than a month, please do yourself a favour and book a college accommodation. I know 400-500 £ per month sounds like very expensive rent, but trust me, it's the normal going rate in Oxford. I made the mistake of booking an Airbnb apartment shared with a non-local couple, and was charged 600 £ per month. I actually thought this was normal for private rentals but that's pretty jacked up rent prices to be honest. Also, if you're an elective student, you'd probably wanna stay as close to the colleges where most of the student social events are happening. You would also perhaps be in the hospital till late, or hanging out with local medical students or other elective students the whole night, so you might come off as being antisocial to your Airbnb hosts (because Airbnb is about interacting with your hosts often). And a word of caution: always check the cancellation policy before making a booking. I was done in by a strict long-term cancellation policy that mandated I would still have to pay for the rest of the booking if I cancelled halfway and moved out.

That said, many people have had pleasant experiences with Airbnb in Oxford. I've heard of a student who stayed for about eight weeks, and every morning her lovely host would make an English breakfast with tea for her. Talk about lucky.

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For Oxford elective students, there is also an option of staying at the Ivy Lane flats just adjacent to the John Radcliffe Hospital. Please do inform the coordinator in advance and as early as possible if you'd like a room there, because the rooms are very limited. They're not the most perfect of accommodations, but its prime location and convenience as well as cheap rent are definitely a plus point.

That's basically it for the basic practical stuff.

And if you're thinking thinking of coming to study in Oxford, make sure you've checked out our guide to getting into the University of Oxford!

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