A Long Weekend In London
Friends, how exciting is this? This is our 5th country we’ve visited since living here to Italy in mid-December 2019! If you want to hear what that move was like, click here!
Given you know who (it has the same name as a great beer with lime in it, starts with Coro and ends with na and it’s currently 2020) I’d say five countries is pretty good!
Anywho, for this year’s labor day we spent a long weekend in London with some of our couple friends!
This was a more laid-back, go with the flow type trip as opposed to a trip like Scotland where we had every day pretty well planned out to make sure we got to do everything we wanted to do. I’d asked on my Instagram stories if you all wanted to see a London blog given it wasn’t a traditional “travel blog,” and more of a “this is what we did and where we ate” sort of blog. You all said yes! I am so glad that yall are loving these blogs as much as I’m writing them. Don’t forget to click here to see my little travel hack and how I save all of my travel inspo and places (including activities and restaurants) that I want to visit in the near or distant future.
Along with a little day by day explanation of what we did, I’m going to share with you a few of the activities and restaurants that I’d saved either from a trip my family did back in the day or my research before heading to London in case you’d like to do some of those too!
On that note, when I was going into high school, the summer before ninth grade, my family and I went to visit London to celebrate my sister graduating from high school as well as my parent’s 30th wedding anniversary. My parents actually spent their honeymoon in London! So of course, we had to visit a few memorable places this time too, which you can see on Day 3!
Alrighty let's hop into it!
Day 1:
We flew from Venice Marco Polo directly into the London Stansted airport. Stansted is the smaller airport as opposed to London Heathrow. From Stansted we took the Stansted Express Train all the way to the end, the Liverpool stop, which took about 50 minutes. From here we purchased an Oyster Card (a refillable tube ticket) and hopped on the Tube to the Holborn Station which took another 10 or so minutes.
Our hotel was just a short walk from the Holborn station. Given all of the walking, hopping on and off trains, I am LOVING my Patagonia Black Hole Duffel that turns into a backpack.
Friends, our hotel was ADORABLE. Our room was tiny, but oh so cute. We stayed at the Hoxton Holborn Hotel. With an alluring lobby, velvet studded couches, and the most aesthetic plant arrangements, I seriously loved it! It had a great bar and restaurant where we had yummy breakfasts, coffees, and delicious cocktails! This hotel was a win for sure, and not too hard on the bank account either! Located in Covent Garden, just a short walk from Piccadilly, SOHO, Westminster, and pretty much anything you’d want to do, I’d absolutely stay here again.
After getting changed from our morning travels it was time to head to afternoon tea of course! Given COVID group size restrictions we had to split up and head to two different places. Some of us went to Sketch (where T and I had a date night later this trip, we’ll get to that!) and the rest of us went to the Diamon Jubilee Tea Salon at Fortnum & Mason.
Friends. The Diamond Jubilee Tea was SO fun! You can’t go to London and not go to tea, you just can’t. With refillable fancy finger sandwiches, scones, and dessert, let alone the tea the Queen herself drinks, you just can’t go wrong! It has the most adorable ambiance, with bright colors, waiters in tuxes, and the fanciest of tea sets, this was right up our alley! My sweet husband drank the tea the the Queen drinks every morning, called “The Queen’s Tea” of course, that has gunpowder in it! How crazy is that! The food was unreal, we ate way too much, topped it off with some lemon raspberry cake, and it was time for pre-dinner drinks.
We all met back up for happy hour at The Alchemist. This is a bar with a mad scientist vibe, where the ingredients list of their cocktails include things like “science” and “magic.” It makes for such a fun experience! Like an interactive candy store but for adults, ya know?!
After a drink or two it was time for dinner. If you’re like “Wow, Di, you guys are really just plowing the food and drinks so far,” you’re not wrong, and you’re really picking up the theme of this weekend ;)
For dinner we went to Din Thai Fung. Which, I should mention, we all live in Northern Italy where all (okay, okay 98%) of the restaurants are Italian. SO MANY of the good restaurants in London are Italian, but we HAD to get our fix of Thai, Indian, and literally any other ethnic food we could while we had the chance!
Anywho, Din Thai Fung was delicious, highly recommend the Cucumber in Spicy Sauce, the Pork Gyoza, and literally any dumpling.
After a long as heck day it was time for a snooze!
Day 2:
We started off day two on the right foot, with coffee of course! In our adorable hotel lobby. They actually had so many non-dairy milks which was so refreshing for your lactose intolerant friends who lives in the land where you sound like an alien when you ask for non-dairy milk!! Hehe
After a proper fueling, we began our stroll toward Westminster Abbey where we had tickets for a 10:30 visit.
We went the long way, strolling through Saint James Park, past the London Eye, and of course Big Ben (which was unfortunately covered in scaffolding - taking advantage of COVID times for some maintenance!). Our lovely adorable husbands decided that proper breakfast was a foot long hotdog with friend onions and more coffee. Yum!!!.... Okay, I can’t lie I had a bite and it was divine. But I let my hubs finish his breakfast hotdog and in we went to the Abbey.
Westminster Abbey is the Church where Princess William and Kate, the Dutchess of Cambridge were married. It’s also where numerous people who made profound contributions to the world we live in today were buried, including King Henry VII, Isaac Newton, Darwin, Charless Dickens, and over 3,000 more. Actually, I accidentally stepped on Darwin. Cool, but also weird, right?!
After about 2 hours (yes, it’s huge, you’ll spend a good amount of time there!), it was time for, you guessed it, lunch! We headed to a little English Pub called The Clarence located right behind Buckingham Palace. Delicious, highly recommend a Tanqueray Flor De Sevilla Gin and Elderflower Fever Tree Tonic. Thank me later ;)
We then strolled to Buckingham Palace through Green Park. If you have the time flexibility, sit in a lawn chair with an iced tea and soak up that fresh summer London air and do some people watching! Such a relaxing time. To top the palace visit off, is it even complete if you don’t try to get the guards attention and make them laugh? Blink? Move at all?!
From here, some of us biked and the rest of walked over to Kensington Palace. It’s about a 30-40 minute walk, but highly worth the steps. My husband and I walked through Hyde Park, one of the most loved and gorgeous parks of London to get to Kensington Palace at the end. If you ride a bike, you can’t ride through the park, so keep that in mind!
From my trip many years ago, I remembered loving Kensington Palace as this is the Palace that Princess Diana lived in. Here, they have an Exhibit with some of Princess Diana’s dresses that I so badly wanted to visit. Unfortunately, we didn’t get there until about an hour before closing, and due to COVID you need a time slot to be able to enter, and there were none left.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but a really fun cafe I’d saved is right over in this area. If you find yourself in Hyde Park or near Kensington Palace you need to make a visit to St. Aymes Cafe. How cute does this look?!
From here we were headed to The Churchill Arms, an adorable traditional British Pub. Unfortunately, so did everyone else in London this afternoon, so instead we made our way to the Kensington Wine Rooms for some vino.
With just a quick tube ride back to our hotel to change it was time for dinner!
Tonight we went to my favorite restaurant of the trip, Nutshell. Nutshell is an Iranian style tapas restaurant with the best tapas and an extensive cocktail list. We ordered all of the appetizers to share, T got the lamb, and I got the spiced chicken. So. Good.
After dinner we headed to Ben and Jerrys (very very unpopular opinion but hard ice cream or dairy queen blizzards beat gelato any day).
Okay, this next place, you HAVE to write this down. You have to go. It’s a need, not a want. The CUTEST little British Bar, with the best, most creative, most fun presented cocktails! It’s called Mr. Fogg’s Gin Parlour. Guys, you have to get The Gentleman Thief okay? It comes in the most stunning gold chalice that makes you feel like a Princess from the 1700s, it’s got the most refreshing fruity yet not too sweet flavor, and it’s topped with, get this, tea-infused Champagne foam! Do I need to say it again? Champagne foam. If this wasn’t made for me I’m not sure what is. The Lover comes in a suspended tea cup hanging from a little artsy contraption, and the Hunter is a husband approved cocktail. Need I say more? You have to go. You’ll notice SO many cocktail bars have gin based drinks. You have to try some, they are delicious!
Last but not least, I’m not sure about y’all but I'm a 10:30 bedtime girl and it was midnight so I was no longer useful. Goodnight!
Day 3:
After day two of a breakfast hot dog, I decided it was time for breakfast at the hotel ;) Little did I know it was SO stinking good. I got a coconut yogurt parfait with a hazelnut milk cappuccino, and my sweet hubs got spicy scrambled eggs over the yummiest sourdough toast. Even if you’re not staying at The Hoxton Holborn, I highly recommend heading here for a yummy breakfast!
From here it was a shopping morning! Unfortunately, it was Sunday and many of the stores didn’t open until around noon which we didn’t realize, but it was still so fun to walk around the adorable shopping streets.
We walked down Bond Street which is where you can find any designer store you love, the Burlington Arcade, Piccadilly Arcade, and Carnaby Street which is full of boutiques and specialty stores.
Guess what’s next? Yep! Food. We went to Bombay Bustle. Today I told my sweet hubs I didn’t want to drink at lunch. And then I saw their mimosa menu where it was pretty much bottomless (you could buy bottles for really cheap) and the most delicious flavors like black pepper strawberry (my favorite) chili mango, and lemongrass blueberry. Well, I had 4. If you know me, that is so much! Ha! But they were SO yum. I also got the truffle scrambled eggs over truffle naan and about died and went ot heaven. The chicken makhanwala is to die for and so is the Pork Sorpotel with sweet potato fries.
After a proper brunch it was time to go see the Queen’s jewels of course, at the Tower of London! I highly recommend this place, especially if you can’t do a lot of the touristy things since you can see so many at this one site. The Tower of London is a castle dating back to the 9th century. Here you can see the King’s chambers, the armour used over the past thousands of years, the Queen’s jewels, and the torture chambers. If this doesn’t spark your interest in reading more about English royal history, or watching shows like The Tudors, I’m not sure what will!
I really wanted to go to the Coppa Club which is right here located right on the river with a view of London Bridge. It has little igloo shaped glass enclosing where you can have lunch or drinks in the coolest vibe. Unfortunately, it’s a very popular place and they were booked out months in advance.
From here it was time to head home for date night with my hubs. Tonight we visited the hotel where my parents stayed on their honeymoon which was oh so special. We spent a couple of hours at Claridge’s Bar to soak up this gorgeous hotel. They also offer a really great tea if you’re in the area!
For dinner, we had such a fun experience at Sketch London. If you’re looking for a trendy, upscale, experience of a dinner, Sketch is the place! With multiple extravagantly decorated rooms, abstract art, delicious food, and the CRAZIEST of bathrooms, you will adore this place! Also a great spot for a champagne tea!
Below is the famous bathroom with egg stalls. Yep, giant egg structures were actually the stalls! So fun.
Day 4:
Day four was the last day with my honey so we spent the morning just the two of us again. We started the day at Bill’s Soho Restaurant for a delicious breakfast, I highly recommend! It has a really gorgeous vibe and aesthetic, and the food is equally pleasing!
From here we actually went in the stores we wanted to visit yesterday but they weren’t open yet and spent the morning and early afternoon doing some shopping. Later this afternoon it was time to send our boys off back to work, and it was just the girls for the rest of the trip!
We stayed closer to the hotel for the rest of the night visiting this fun rubber stamp collectors store, and this gorgeous bookstore, The London Review Bookshop. It’s funny, we all feel so deprived of bookstores! Of course they have them here, but none of us are fluent enough to make it worth while! So finding a bookstore with books written in English was such a treat. P.S. if you’re new around here and have no idea what I’m talking about, my sweet husband and I are living in Northern Italy at the moment and loving every second!
We stopped for tea and drinks before heading to Tonkotsu for some delicious Ramen. Is it crazy that this was actually my first time having ramen? That doesn’t come in a plastic square package with a paper filled pocket of seasoning? It definitely did not disappoint either!
Afterward, we headed to Circulo Populare for drinks. This place was GORGEOUS, the atmosphere was so fun, and the food looked delicious. However, it was Italian so that was a no for us on the food side ;) We all shared The Big Fish which was a rum based tropical cocktail for two served in, you guessed it, a big glass fish.
And the topped off a wonderful fourth day!
Day 5:
Today was our travel day home, but our flight out wasn’t until 6pm so we had the morning to wander.
Given we had to make the trek back to the airport we didn’t stray too far today. We began the day with another delicious hotel breakfast and walked over to Carnaby Street again.
After which it was time for one last English Tea stop at Marchesi, a charming and elegant tea shop.
To end this trip on the right foot, of course we had to have one last yummy meal! We chose lunch at Dishoom, a delicious Indian Restaurant. Besides have an entire plate of lamb curry spilled on my by the waiter (yep, it happened, God bless friends with extra clothesnin their backpacks!!), it was DELISH! You have to try the broccoli salad and you just can’t go wrong with garlic naan!
And then it was back to the train to head to the airport.
We did a lot of eating, a lot of drinking, a lot of walking, and we loved it! As you can see we didn’t visit a ton of museums or sites, so I wanted to put together a little list that I’d made before we left of things to do and places to eat so that you could get the most out of your future trip!
Things to to:
Theater of course - covid closed
Portabello Market
Windsor Palace
London Eye
Kensington Palace
Kensington Palace Princess Diana Exhibit
Boat to Greenwich - where they came up with the concept of the world clock and time.
Notting Hill
British Museum
Imperial War Museum
Museum of Natural History
Changing of the guard - due to COVID this cannot be viewed right now
Sit in Hyde Park
Cafes/Bars:
Restaurants:
The Ivy Chelsea Garden - this is the same place that we had breakfast at in Edinburgh. You can read all about our unforgettable Scotland Road Trip here!
Alright friends, that’s it! I hope you enjoyed! I’d lope to here which places you’re saving, or places you think I need to visit next time! Go ahead and leave a comment on this post, or shoot me a DM over on Instagram here!
P.S. for this trip you need to book all time slots for castles, museums, etc. as well as reservations for all meals due to COVID if you are visiting in those times.
XO,
Di