London (Fodor's 2012) - Fodor's [13]
Fortnum & Mason.
Upstairs at the revamped 300-year-old Queen’s grocers, three set teas are ceremoniously served: Afternoon Tea (sandwiches, scones, and cakes: £344), old-fashioned High Tea (the traditional nursery meal, with scrambled eggs and salmon: £36), and Champagne Tea (price according to Champagne). Teas Mon.–Sat. noon to 6:30, Sun. noon to 4:30. | St. James’s Restaurant, 4th fl.,181 Piccadilly, St. James’s | W1A 1ER | 020/7734–8040 | AE, DC, MC, V | Tea Mon.–Sat. noon–6:30, Sun. noon–4:30 | Green Park.
The Ritz.
At the Ritz tea is served in the impressive Palm Court, with marble tables and Louis XIV chaises complete with musical accompaniment, giving the last morsel of Edwardian London. Afternoon Tea is £39 and Champagne Tea £50. Reserve two to three months ahead and remember to wear a jacket and tie. | 150 Piccadilly, St. James’s | W1J 9BR | 020/7300–2309 | Reservations essential | AE, MC, V | Tea daily 11:30, 1:30, 3:30, 5:30, 7:30 | Green Park.
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Unforgettable London moments are rarely captured in picture-postcard settings like Trafalgar Square or Piccadilly Circus, but tucked away off the main drag or in more prosaic and unexpected locales: with a pint at a hospitable pub, amid the tottering clutter of an antiques shop, on a park bench in a smart London garden, or in a welcoming centuries-old church beneath glass-and-steel towers in The City. Like a four-leaf clover, you’ll come up them only unexpectedly.
WANDER ABOUT A MARKET
London’s markets are perfect for an aimless Sunday morning potter, along with locals who aren’t quite sure what they’re doing there either.
The most fun is Portobello, full of great clothes and jewelry from local designers, and plenty of cafés and pubs to drop into along the way.
DISCOVER PUB CULTURE
Although fashionable coffee shops now dot every street, it’s still the pub that Londoners are drawn to the minute the working day finishes.
Don’t get sucked into the big chains, such as Pitcher and Piano or All Bar One—head instead for the ones with kooky names straight out of a Monty Python sketch. Scuffed carpets, dartboards, and old chaps propping up the bar are all essential.
GO TO ANY FOOTBALL MATCH
Football fires up Londoners’ blood and nowhere does it get more adoring, tribal, and high-pitched than at a 30,000-strong stadium on Match Day.
These are emotional pressure-cookers where fans come for moments of sporting epiphany or damnation. Tickets can be like gold dust, but lower-division teams (Barnet, Brentford, Charlton Athletic, Crystal Palace, Millwall, Leyton Orient, or Queens Park Rangers) will be less heavily booked up.
EAT AT A GREASY SPOON
The fatty delights of a London greasy-spoon breakfast are well-known among London’s party animals as a peerless hangover cure.
A classic “full English” breakfast—fried bacon, fried egg, baked beans, mushrooms, and tomatoes (and black pudding for the truly carefree)—all washed down with a mug of strong tea while reading the Sun or any other red-top rag is a sinful joy. Just don’t tell your doctor.
TAKE A NIGHT BUS HOME
Like the street sweepers they overtake, these buses pick up the living leftovers of a thousand different nights out in the capital.
Sometimes there are so many stops that it seems it will be dawn before you get to where you want to go, but the endless procession of passengers (and the speed and humor of their banter) is what makes the trip interesting.
PARTY IN HOXTON
This neighborhood is no longer the ultrahip brother-in-charms to Manhattan’s Lower East Side that it once was, but maybe it’s for the better.
Nowadays, the mullet-headed fashionistas and art school