The Rough Guide to London - Softcover

Humphreys, Rob

Softcover

ISBN 10: 185828404X ISBN 13: 9781858284040

Publisher: Rough Guides, 1999

Synopsis

The Rough Guide to London is the ultimate travel guide to one of the world's most exciting cities. In full color throughout and with dozens of photos to illustrate London's great buildings, iconic landmarks, and distinctive neighborhoods, this updated guidebook will show you the best the city has to offer, from Olympic Park to markets and museums, gourmet restaurants, and hidden pubs.

London has something for everyone — art galleries and shopping arcades, spacious parks and grand palaces — and The Rough Guide to London uncovers it all. Detailed color maps for each neighborhood, plus a tube map and practical information on all the essentials, make getting around easy. With chapters dedicated to the best hotels, restaurants and cafés, pubs and bars, live music and clubs, shops, theater, kids' activities, and more, you'll be sure to make the most of your time in the city with The Rough Guide to London.

About this title

About the Author

Rob Humphreys has been writing for Rough Guides since 1989. He has traveled extensively, writing Pocket Rough Guide London (with S. Cook), Pocket Rough Guide Prague, and The Rough Guide to London (with S. Cook). Rob is also the coauthor of The Rough Guide to Scotland, The Rough Guide to Scottish Highlands & Islands, and The Great Glen Rough Guides Snapshot Scotland.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Introduction

What strikes visitors more than anything about London is the sheer size of the place. The population - currently around seven million - may be declining, but it is still by far Europe's largest city, spreading across an area of more than 620 square miles from its core on the River Thames. Londoners tend to cope with this by compartmentalizing the city, identifying with the neighbourhoods in which they work or live, and making occasional forays into the "centre of town" - the West End, London's shopping and entertainment heartland.

Those without local roots can find the place bafflingly diverse. With around two hundred languages spoken within its confines and all the major religions represented, London can seem more like an entire country than a single city, and it is Europe's most multiethnic metropolis. Over thirty percent of the population is made up of first, second- and third-generation immigrants, while some claim as many as 75 percent of white Londoners are in fact descended from French Huguenot refugees.

Whatever its exact make-up, London has a pre-eminent status in Britain: it's where the country's news and money are made, it's where the central government resides and, as far as its inhabitants are concerned, provincial life begins beyond the circuit of the city's orbital motorway. Londoners' sense of superiority causes enormous resentment in the regions, yet it's undeniable that the capital has a unique aura of excitement and success - in most walks of British life, if you want to get on you've got to do so in London.

Despite its dominant role, however, London remains the only capital city in Europe to enter the new millennium without its own governing body, a symptom of more than a decade and a half's political indifference from previous Conservative governments. This neglect, compounded by a political culture that penalizes the unfortunate, has resulted in a city of spiralling extremes - ostentatious private affluence and increasing public squalor. At night, the West End is packed with theatregoers, while the doorways and shopfronts continue to serve as dormitories for London's dispossessed. London's problems are perfectly illustrated by the city's chaotic transport system, which is one of the most expensive in the world. Despite the huge expense, the tube network remains at breaking point, and the buses are notoriously unreliable and overcrowded.

London should undoubtedly be better than it is, but it is still a thrilling place. Its museums and galleries - the British Museum, the Tate, and scores of smaller specialists - are among the finest in the world, while monuments from the capital's more glorious past are everywhere to be seen, from medieval banqueting halls and the great churches of Sir Christopher Wren to the eclectic Victorian architecture of the triumphalist British Empire. The major sights - Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, St Paul's Cathedral and the Tower of London - draw in millions of tourists every year, and in most cases rightly so. Yet there is as much enjoyment to be had from the city's quiet Georgian squares, the narrow alleyways of the City of London, the riverside walks, and the quirks of what is still identifiably a collection of villages. And even London's traffic pollution - one of its worst problems - is offset by surprisingly large expanses of greenery: Hyde Park, Green Park and St James's Park are all within a few minutes' walk of the West End, while, further afield, you can enjoy the more expansive parklands of Hampstead Heath and Richmond Park.

You could spend days just shopping in London, too, hobnobbing with the ruling classes in Harrods, or sampling the offbeat weekend markets of Portobello Road and Camden, the seedbed of London's famously innovative street fashion, which provides fertile ground for the capital's home-grown talent. The music, clubbing and gay/lesbian scene is second to none, and mainstream arts are no less exciting, with regular opportunities to catch brilliant theatre companies, dance troupes, exhibitions and opera.

Restaurants, these days, are an attraction, too. London has caught up with its European rivals, and offers a range from three-star Michelin establishments to low-cost, high-quality Indian curry houses. Meanwhile, the city's pubs have heaps of atmosphere, especially away from the centre - and an exploration of the farther-flung communities is essential to get the complete picture of this dynamic metropolis.

When to go Considering the temperateness of the English climate, it's amazing how much mileage the locals get out of the subject - a two-day cold snap is discussed as if it were the onset of a new Ice Age, and a week in the upper 70s starts rumours of drought. The fact is that English summers rarely get hot and the winters don't get very cold, though they're often wet. The bottom line is that it's impossible to say with any degree of certainty that the weather will be pleasant in any given month. May might be wet and grey one year and gloriously sunny the next, and the same goes for the autumnal months - November stands an equal chance of being crisp and clear or foggy and grim.

As far as crowds go, tourists stream into London pretty much all year round, with peak season from Easter to October, and the biggest crush in July and August, when you'll need to book your accommodation well in advance. Costs, however, are pretty uniform year-round.

Edition details

• Publisher: Rough Guides
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 185828404X
• ISBN 13: 9781858284040
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 3
• Number of pages: 672