Things to Do
What to actually do in London when you have limited time and no interest in the tourist trail. Written for short stays, weighted toward the evening.
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The landmark pages carry the numbers the attractions themselves bury. The queue at the London Eye runs up to forty five minutes on top of your ticket time rather than inside it, and the Harry Potter Studio Tour sells a package with a hotel in it for less than the one with a bus. The Shard, Sky Garden and Horizon 22 cover the views from above, and two of the three cost nothing.
Then the free half of the city: the parks, the museums that charge nothing and the food markets, where the published closing times regularly contradict each other on the market’s own website.
Seasonal pages appear when they are useful and are rechecked rather than recycled. Rain, weekends and Christmas each have their own.
London Slang, Checked Against the Dictionary
Roadman has three meanings in Green's Dictionary of Slang and only one is the modern one. The words outsiders get backwards, and the ones the dictionary has never recorded.
The South Bank: What Is Free, and the Library Nobody Finds
The Southbank Centre runs free exhibitions alongside its ticketed ones, publishes no site-wide opening time, and hides the world's largest modern poetry collection on Level 5.
The London Skyline: What You Are Looking At, and Where to Stand
The Shard will refund your view if you cannot spot three of five landmarks, but only if you ask before you leave. The buildings, the free viewpoints and the river route.
Crossness Pumping Station: Book the Steaming Day, Not the Tour
The beam engine only runs on Steaming Days, and the free vintage bus from Abbey Wood only runs then too. Prices, open dates and the memberships that cut the cost.
Hampstead Heath: Swim for 5 Pounds, and the Free Zoo
The same Lido swim is 8.80 pounds at midday and 5 at breakfast, when children go free. Pond prices, the booking rule, and the free zoo at Golders Hill.
Walthamstow Wetlands: Free, No Dogs, and a Hijacked Website
The old walthamstowwetlands.com now serves a casino site. The real opening times, the earlier weekend last entry, and why no dog is allowed in.
Chelsea Physic Garden: Closed Saturdays, and a Two for One
It shuts on the one day most people try to go, the 15 pound ticket includes an optional donation, and National Rail Days Out gets two in for the price of one.
Battersea Power Station: Free to Enter, and the Lift Price Trap
The building costs nothing and is fully enclosed. The Chimney Lift, formerly Lift 109, is 16 pounds booked and 24 on the day. Hours, parking tariffs and the river bus.
Cecil Court: 23 Dealers, and One Opens on Sunday
Only Watkins Books trades on a Sunday. The shop by shop opening hours of London's rare book lane, two Alice specialists, and the window when everything is open at once.
St Dunstan in the East: Free, and It Shuts at Dusk
The published hours say 7pm. The rule is 7pm or dusk, whichever is earlier, so in December the garden closes around four. The ruin, the history and the photography rule.
Elsewhere in the guide
Questions we get asked
What can you do in London for free?
The national museums, which includes the British Museum, the National Gallery, the Tate galleries, the V and A and the Natural History Museum. Permanent collections are free and always have been; only the temporary exhibitions charge.
How many days do you need in London?
Three gets you the centre without rushing it. Five lets you spend a day outside zone one, which is where London stops being a list of sights and starts being a city. Anything under two days is a transit stop rather than a visit.
What is worth doing in London in bad weather?
Most of the best of it is indoors anyway. The museums, the department stores, afternoon tea, the pubs that have been there for centuries, and the theatre. London is not a city whose case rests on the weather.