...you'd take a tourist to, where would it be?
I'm looking for ideas a bit outside the box, and am interested in some gems that wouldn't immediately spring to mind.
...you'd take a tourist to, where would it be?
I'm looking for ideas a bit outside the box, and am interested in some gems that wouldn't immediately spring to mind.
Greenwich. Nice area, Observatory, park, maritime museum, cutty sark, victorian foot tunnel under the thames, some decent restaurants/bistros.
When I had to do a quick 'tour of London' for people, I had a walk to cover most of the traditional image sites. Some are good, some are crap, but they are the kind of thing that you need to say you saw. So the walk started at Picadilly Circus (crap, of course), Haymarket to Trafalgar Square, then down the Mall to Buckingham Palace, back through St James' Park to Horse Guards, round the back to Parliament square, quick peek at Downing street and then Westminster tube it to Tower Hill so they can see the Tower and Tower Bridge. That covers the main stuff. Specials needing more time are St Paul's which is pretty neat. But as a one-off, I still like Greenwich.
St Paul's is bloody expensive
MrsL and me went the first time she came (stop it) to see me for a weekend.
Very impressive building though and you can see The Emirates from the top.
I like the sort of walk Coney outlines, there's not loads to see really but there's a nice buzz about the place.
If I had visitors for a few days, I'd do the walk on the first day to just get all that stuff out of the way. When I lived in London I had two favourite walks I would do if I just needed to get away for a few hours. One was to start at the Tate Gallery (the REAL one near Pimlico) admire the Turners and stuff and then just basically follow the Thames to the Embankment. The other was to take what was then called 'The North London Line' (now 'Silverlink' I think?) from Dalston or Highbury&Islington and to Richmond (shares the line from Gunnersbury to Richmond with the District Line). At Richmond, I'd cross the fields to the Thames and then walk back towards Kew Gardens, spend some time there and then return via Kew Gardens station. As long as you can ignore the bloody planes, it's a lovely place.
A walk along the South Bank is always worthwhile.
Oi, geezer, get a Thames Clipper Rover ticket for the day - it connects up all the suggestions above and the Thames is the essence of London...
Museum of London Docklands is also good, as is Borough Market and Colombia Road market on a Sunday...
Pubs Lamb and Flag, Famous Angel or any Wetherspoons...
Oi, swede muncher, that's the Overground now...if you go south from Highbury and Islington to New Cross you go through the Brunel Tunnel...Victorian Engineeringtastic...
Hampstead Heath is nice, some very nice views of the city.