Events

Get in line! It’s London Open House Weekend!

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Good morning London Baby readers!

It’s a (hopefully not too rainy) weekend ahead, and its London Open House weekend. Before I even get started, I have a confession to make: as much as I love pretending I am an expert of all-that-is-London, Open House weekend is totally out of my expertise. Often, I have not been in town, and if I have, I was very unprepared. Usually, friends of mine are trying to win tickets for the hottest venues for us already months before in the lottery ticket system, but we are never successful. On the weekend, I found myself in some of the most absurd long Q’s at Battersea Power Station or elsewhere, so its not been such a success for me until now 🙂

However, it is a genuine and beloved highlight in the London events calendar, so I do want to give you a bit of background and one or the other tip of buildings to see.

So what is the London Open House weekend?

To celebrate and promote London’s architecture and design, more than 800 venues, many of them usually not open to the public, open their doors over this weekend. This Continue reading →

A sneak preview of the Literary Footprints Festival

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Happy Sunday everyone! Time for a new guest blog, this time from London Baby’s favourite London Guide. Rob Smith is a London walking guide with Footprints of London  and his guest blog looks at Literary Locations in London. In October Footprints of London are holding the Literary Footprints Festival – a series of walks celebrating London’s literary heritage. Continue reading →

How to meet the Queen and get married to Prince Harry

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Royal Wedding Carriage Kate and William

Confession time: London Baby has a weak spot. For the Royal Family. Of the UK, of the Netherlands, and probably for most countries if I ever move to it and they have a royal family.

The bad news: even though I am so obsessed with them, I still have not managed to get a personal meeting with the Queen or to have married Prince Harry. Yes, the title is a pure attention sucker!

The good news: Living in London offers you countless opportunities to SEE members of the Royal Family in real life! and even better news: one of the best opportunities of the year is coming up TOMORROW (Saturday 13th June)!

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Free Walks this Weekend! Your guide to the Walk London Spring into Summer Weekend

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If you are still wondering what to do this weekend, or if you finally wanted to go on a guided walk and you have put it off for whatever reason, this weekend offers a great opportunity to get walking!

Walk London is having their annual spring weekend of free walks (there are further weekends in January and September). That’s more than 40 guided walks through all areas of London, all funded and paid for by TfL. Many of those are normally paid walks. They come in all sizes and interests – short walks, touristy walks, special topics (e.g. literary or spy walks), central location, outside, long walks….there is even one section of the Capital Ring covered!

They even created a map, showing the starting points of all walks:

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The Hunting Season has started

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It’s been such good weather in the last weeks. When the sun is shining, London just asks to be explored and is showing her best sides.

While there are many ways to just start exploring, a favourite of mine are (treasure) hunts.

When you google “London Treasure hunts”, there will be a multitude of hits, ranging from humble “print out the sheets yourself” to full- fledged organised events that do not even quote a price on their website (which I always find highly suspicious….:))

In this post, I would like to introduce you to two organised hunts and I can recommend them both. At each, you’ll be entertained for at least 2 hours (possibly even longer), you get to know many new places even in neighbourhoods you thought you knew, but its all a bit more independent and lighter than a classical walk or guided tour.

The two companies / hunts I will introduce below are called “A door in a wall” and “In the Hidden City”.

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Boat race or Goat Race! (Updated)

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Good morning to a hopefully sunny Saturday!

Today is a big day, at least for 16 rowers and their squat as well as…2 goats and their support staff!  It’s the day of the traditional Oxford vs. Cambridge Boat race (a.k.a. the BNY Mellon Boat race) and its younger brother the Goat Race at Spitalfields City Farm (a.k.a. The Goat Race). So if you have no plans, why not make it a nice afternoon out? I’ll try to give you an overview, some race / viewing information, and what else you could do before or after. I apologise in advance for not using own picture material, but I have never been lucky enough to get tickets for the Goat Race and my one visit to the Boat Race was so rainy that the camera was not usable…

Small update (Spoiler Alert): The 2015 results are in, Oxford had a good year with snatching the victory at all 3 events (Boat’s Race men and women as well as Goat’s race). Also, thanks to a feedback from one of the readers, who is in the know, I corrected the history section below- not only was the women’s race held first this year, but it was the first time, that there was a women’s race on this day! Thanks! 

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