There has been a pub on this spot since 1242, which makes The Bear one of the oldest drinking houses in England. Duck through the low doorway, find a corner, and settle in with a pint. You'll understand why it has lasted nearly eight centuries.
The Bear sits down a narrow lane just off the High Street, easy to walk past if you don't know it's there. Inside, the rooms are small and dark-panelled, the ceilings low enough that taller visitors learn to stoop. Glass cases on the walls hold thousands of snipped-off ties: regiment ties, club ties, school ties, collected over decades by landlords who offered a free pint in exchange for a cutting. The whole place feels like a gentle conspiracy against the modern world.
It is a proper pub, not a gastropub or a wine bar in disguise. The beer is well kept, the food is honest, and nobody is in a hurry. On a weekday afternoon you might share the bar with a couple of dons marking papers; on a Friday evening it fills with students and locals and the noise spills out into the lane. From the cottage it is about a 35-minute drive, and pairs perfectly with an afternoon wandering the colleges, the Covered Market, or the Bodleian.
“Genuinely one of those pubs that feels unchanged. Order a pint, look up at the tie collection, and try not to lose an entire afternoon.”
All of this on the doorstep, and your own thatched cottage to come home to. Sleeps seven, less than a mile from Soho Farmhouse.