London

101 things to do before you leave London

Visit the Shree Swaminarayan temple

1 Visit the Shree Swaminarayan temple
The gleaming pinnacles and pillars of the Shree Swaminarayan Mandir would be an extraordinary sight anywhere – but rising out of Neasden, they are particularly special. This Hindu temple is the biggest in the Western hemisphere. Some 2,820 tonnes of Bulgarian limestone and 2,000 tonnes of marble from Italy were carved in India by hundreds of craftsmen before being shipped to London and assembled over three years. Dress respectfully to enter.
Shree Swaminarayan Mandir, 105-119 Brentfield Rd, NW10 (020 8965 2651/www.mandir.org).
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2 Try on a bearskin at the Guards Museum
Learn about the glorious history of the Grenadier, Coldstream, Scots, Irish and Welsh Guards. At 10.50am every day (from April to August), the Guards line up outside the Museum in preparations for Changing the Guard.
Guards Museum, Wellington Barracks, Birdcage Walk, SW1 (020 7414 3271/ www.theguardsmuseum.com).

Learn swordplay

3 Learn swordplay
Beginners are welcome at the Saturday afternoon session at Marcello Zizzari’s Japanese sword class at the Islington Arts Factory (2 Parkhurst Road, N7; 020 7704 6796/www.battodo-fudokan.co.uk). Classes cost £5 for an introduction, then £40 for six weeks.

4 Learn to mix a martini
Dirty, naked, smoky, muddy – no, not a hike through a Laotian jungle, but the range of martinis you’ll learn how to mix at masterclasses held at Christopher’s.
Christopher’s American Bar & Grill, 18 Wellington St, WC2 (020 7240 4222/ www.christophersgrill.com). Hour-long session £12.

Go to the loos at Sketch

5 Spend a penny in the loos at Sketch
A pair of sweeping staircases leading up from the circular bar take you to an entire floor devoted to toilets, in the form of 11 pods.
Sketch, 9 Conduit St, W1 (0870 777 4488).

6 Watch the Peter Pan cup
Every Christmas morning members of the Serpentine Swimming Club (www.serpentineswimmingclub.com) bravely plunge into the frosty waters of Hyde Park’s pond.

7-11 Have a literary night out
Run by Time Out favourite Robin Ince, the Book Club is probably the most innovative comedy show in town. It takes place monthly, sometimes fortnightly, at the Albany (20 Great Portland Street, W1; 020 7387 0221). Fantastically weird.

‘A bi-monthly bonding of brains and beautiful people over books, bands and bellinis’ is how the organisers of B Club describe this free soirée at the Great Eastern Hotel (40 Liverpool Street, EC2; 020 7618 5000/www.thebclub.co.uk).

Getting into monthly musical-literary club Book Slam used to be a case of camping out for hours or organising your tickets far in advance. Until, that is, the organisers – author Patrick Neate and Everything But the Girl’s Ben Watt – relocated from poky club Cherry Jam to the more spacious Neighbourhood (12 Acklam Road, W10; 020 8960 9331/www.bookslam.com).

The First Tuesday Poetry Club, now at Clerkenwell’s Three Kings (7 Clerkenwell Close, EC1; 020 7253 0483), celebrated its first anniversary at the end of last year.

If you wind your way to the back of the Volupte Bar on the first Tuesday of the month, you’ll find bohemian night Poejazzi (7-9 Norwich Street, close to Chancery Lane, EC4. 0207 8311 622/www.myspace.com/poejazzi).

Dance the night away at the Rivoli Ballroom

12 Dance to vintage American tunes
At the spectacular Rivoli Ballroom.
Rivoli Ballroom, 350 Brockley Rd, SE4 (020 8692 5130/www.jiveparty.com).

13 Get an allotment
Getting one in London takes patience – you can be stuck on a waiting list for years. Your best bet is to look on the fringes of London rather than in the centre. Otherwise, it’s relatively simple. Contact your local council or check out www.londonallotments.net, a forum that lists spare plots as well as waiting times.

14-17 Get alongside some of London’s ghosts
A séance discerned that a spook at Covent Garden tube was the ghost of William Terris, murdered by a fellow thesp outside the Adelphi Theatre in 1897.

The more scenic location of St James’s Park is the stamping ground of the headless Lady of the Lake, who is sometimes seen to be emerging from the water, drifting on to land and then breaking into a frantic run.

Soho’s John Snow boozer (29 Broadwick Street, W1; 020 7437 1344) was named after a doctor who discovered that cholera was a waterborne disease. The pub is haunted by a shadowy figure who sits in a dark corner – he is believed to be a victim of a cholera epidemic.

If you want guidance in such matters, Richard Jones runs Ghost Walks (www.london-ghost-walk.co.uk) that take you through alleyways and graveyards for the maximum chill factor.

18 Scuba dive
The London School of Diving (11 Power Road, W4; 020 8995 0002/www.londonschoolofdiving.com), with its on-site pool, is the capital’s only purpose-built dive centre. Courses cost from £25. For other diving clubs, contact the British Sub-Aqua Club (0151 350 6200/ www.bsac.com).

19 Browse the Petrie Museum with a torch
Its aged wooden cabinets are filled with shards of ancient Egyptian pottery, grooming accessories, jewellery and primitive tools. The fact some corners of this small museum are so gloomy that staff offer torches only adds to the fun.
Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, University College London, Malet Place, WC1 (7679 2884/www.petrie.ucl.ac.uk).

20-24 My favourites…
Julie Myerson, author
I love going to Borough Market on a Saturday morning, then Spitalfields Market in the afternoon with my teenage children. The Old Operating Theatre & Herb Garret (9a St Thomas’s Street, SE1; 020 7188 2679/www.thegarret.org.uk) is magic – and strange. Walworth Road has two fabulous restaurants. Dragon Castle (114 Walworth Road, SE17; 020 7277 3388) is a deliciously opulent Chinese, while La Luna (380 Walworth Road, SE17; 020 7277 1991) is a friendly Italian.

25-30 Drink in an old gin palace
Only a handful still exist, but they’re well worth a visit (even if pints and Kettle Chips have replaced gin as the big sellers). Starting centrally, last time we looked, the Princess Louise (208-209 High Holborn, WC1; 020 7405 8816), built in 1872, was missing only its original partitions. Perhaps they’ll be restored when owner Sam Smith’s completes the old girl’s makeover in December.

In Soho, the Argyll Arms (18 Argyll Street, W1; 020 7734 6117) boasts Victorian etched mirrors, snob screens and mahogany; the original layout is intact too – a corridor leads to the large back saloon past three small snug bars. For knockout Victoriana, the Albert (52 Victoria Street, SW1; 020 7222 5577) is a fabulous confection of hand-cut glass, carved dark wood and old gaslight fittings, built in the 1860s to honour the empress’s departed prince.

The City is where many old-timers of the London pub world are still standing. For example, the Viaduct Tavern (126 Newgate Street, EC1; 020 7600 1863), an 1869 pub, is just across the road from the Old Bailey. Up in north London is the Island Queen (87 Noel Road, N1; 020 7704 7631). Swathed in wood and etched glass, it celebrates nautical glory with a wave-damaged wooden figurehead, palm leaves and prints of ships; a vast island bar presides over the middle of the lofty single room.

Best of the lot, though, is the Prince Alfred (5a Formosa Street, W9; 020 7286 3287). The beautiful old tiling and exquisitely curved frosted glass frontage barely prepare you for the architectural delights within: a complex series of snugs with a fabulously ornate half-moon dark-wood bar as centrepiece. The snugs (free to hire!) once kept the proles apart from the toffs, and stand now as fascinating testimony to the British class system.

Finally, south of the river, the finest example is probably the cathedral-like Duke of Devonshire (39 Balham High Road, SW12; 020 8673 1363). As well as its ornate, hall-of-mirrors interior, it’s one south London pub where you’re guaranteed not to run into our ever-controversial editor-at-large, Michael Hodges. He was barred for ‘fisticuffs’ in 1998.

Buy a retro phone

31 Shop for vintage phones at Radio Days
The choice of reconditioned retro radios at this vintage favourite is pretty good, but it’s only one facet of a laidback and reasonably priced emporium. Old-fashioned phones are a highlight, with lots of Bakelite beauties dating from the 1930s onwards.
Radio Days, 87 Lower Marsh, SE1 (020 7928 0800/www.radiodaysvintage.co.uk).

32 Make yourself part of the Critical Mass
By cycling in a large group, Critical Mass (www.criticalmasslondon.org.uk) forces the motorised traffic to give way to the pedalled variety. The regular group ride takes place on the last Friday of every month, starting at 6.30pm from under Waterloo Bridge on the South Bank.

33-35 Get a table without booking
Head to global tapas bar the Tapa Room (109 Marylebone High Street, W1; 020 7935 6175/ www.theprovidores.co.uk/tapa.html), on the ground floor below restaurant The Providores; it runs a no-reservations policy. Further west, the Bibendum Oyster Bar (Michelin House, 81 Fulham Road, SW3; 020 7589 1480/ www.bibendum.co.uk/oyster-bar.htm) doesn’t take bookings either: go there for excellent seafood in pared-down surroundings. Lastly, the bar at popular St John (26 St John Street, EC1; 020 7251 0848/www.stjohnrestaurant.com/bar) is first-come, first-served; it offers a shorter but equally extraordinary version of the restaurant’s menu of British food.

36 Drink shochu
The focus at the Shochu Lounge (Roka, 37 Charlotte Street, W1; 020 7580 9666/www.shochulounge.com) is on Japan’s vodka-like spirit shochu, here tinctured with ingredients such as cinnamon (‘for joy of life’) or lemon (‘for virility’), served neat or in cocktails. Set in the basement, the wooden vats and rustic bar counters, low tables and plush red seats make for a setting that’s half style bar, half film set for ‘Zatoichi’.

37 Learn how to be a blacksmith
Classes run by Kevin Boys at Surrey Docks Farm (South Wharf, Rotherhithe Street, SE16; 020 7237 1408) teach you how to get to grips with hammer and tongs. A set of four sessions is £80.

38 Watch a horse being blessed
Continuing a tradition started in 1968, when the stables in Hyde Park were threatened with closure, Horseman’s Sunday in mid-September sees the vicar of St John’s Church (Hyde Park Crescent, W2; 020 7262 1732/ www.stjohns-hydepark.com) bless 100 horses. It’s quite a sight.

39 Take up jeet kune do
Jeet kune do is a simple, direct martial art. Why bother stamping on an attacker’s foot, grabbing their hand and subduing them with an arm bar when a simple strike to the throat would do the job? Six-week beginners’ courses at the Bob Breen Academy (16 Hoxton Square, N1; 020 7729 5789/www.bobbreen.co.uk) cost £150.

40-44 My favourites…
Christian O’Connell, DJ
One of our family treats is to go to the Charlotte Street Hotel (15-17 Charlotte Street, W1; 020 7806 2000/www.charlottestreethotel.com) for a posh breakfast. I started my stag do at the gorgeous tapas bar Navarro’s (67 Charlotte Street, W1; 020 7637 7713/ www.navarros.co.uk).

Every Saturday and Sunday at 8am I walk to Richmond Deer Park (Holly Lodge, TW10; 020 8948 3209). It’s so beautiful. We have picnics by the lakes in the summer. Also on a Saturday I love going to the library with my dad. The British Library (96 Euston Road, NW1; 020 7412 7332/www.bl.uk) has such a unique aura.

Shopping-wise, I love the fantastic Italian shirt shop Interno 8 (19 Conduit Street, W1; 020 7493 5603/ www.interno8.net). It’s a real treat to go there for any annual buy.

The Christian O’Connell Breakfast Show is on Virgin Radio Mon-Fri 6am-10am.

45 Loiter around the stage door
Autograph-hunters, out-of-towners, gawkers and stalkers: just who does hang around the back entrances of West End theatres? Time Out meets the theatre fanatics who brave the cold to meet the stars of London's West End. Click here to read more.

46 Go to Wembley
Don’t try to get a close-up view of the 133-metre arch or retractable roof on Saturday, when Chelsea play Manchester United in the FA Cup Final, but a visit is essential whether you’re interested in sport, architecture or technology. Or you just want to see how it could possibly end up costing £757 million. Guided tours will be available later this year – register your interest on the website (www.wembleystadium.com).

47 Play bar billiards
An ideal workout to accompany a pint, bar billiards involves sinking balls in holes of varying difficulty, without knocking down the skittles that protect the most high-scoring holes. There are tables at Pembury Tavern (90 Amhurst Road, E8; 020 8986 8597), The Selkirk (60 Selkirk Road, SW17; 020 8672 6235) and Surprise at Chelsea (6 Christchurch Terrace, SW3; 020 7349 1821).

48-54 My favourites…
Suggs
One of the places that I really love in London is the Inner Circle in Regent’s Park (Regent’s Park, NW1; 020 7486 7905). In the summer it has a wonderful rose garden – like something out of a fairy story. The park’s open-air theatre (020 7935 5756/www.openairtheatre.org) is also a fantastic way to spend an afternoon. When it comes to pubs, I love the Dublin Castle (94 Parkway NW1; 020 7485 1773/ www.dublincastle.co.uk). It’s a great live music venue; Madness basically started their career there.

One of my favourite shops is James Lock & Co (6 St James’s St, SW1; 020 7930 8874/www.lockhatters.co.uk). It’s the only place that Nelson and Wellington ever met, as they both bought their hats there.

For lunch I love the tapas at Barrafina (54 Frith St, W1; 020 7813 8016). And every day before my radio show I get coffee at Bar Italia (22 Frith St, W1; 020 7437 4520). If you’re looking for the best Guinness in London, go to the Toucan (19 Carlisle St, W1; 020 7437 4123/www.thetoucan.co.uk). Always full of funny old characters.

I regularly go out for dinner to St John’s (91 Junction Rd, N19; 020 7272 1587). There’s a jolly atmosphere about it, and the food and wine are fabulous. I’d recommend the Venezuelan brandy!

Listen to Afternoon Tea with Suggs on Virgin Radio every weekday 2-4pm.

55 Drink real ales at the Wenlock
Built in 1835 and opened as a pub a year later, the draw here is the variety of speciality ales, with picturesque names like Top Totty, Hebridean Berserker, Pictish Claymore and Dark Star Nut Brown Ale. Darts, an open fire, a piano and a list of football fixtures testify to the traditional, community-based nature of the place.
Wenlock Arms, 26 Wenlock Road, N1 (020 7608 3406/www.wenlock-arms.co.uk).

56 Watch Irish hurling
Hurling is Europe’s oldest team game and hugely popular in Ireland. The 15-a-side game is fast, furious and really quite violent – perfect pub-telly fodder. The Corrib Rest (76-82 Salisbury Road, NW6; 020 7625 9585) in Queen’s Park is one hurling-loving pub, the Crown & Cushion (133 Westminster Bridge Road SE1, 020 7928 4795) another, but you can also visit just about every pub in Kentish Town and Kilburn and find it taking pride of place on the TV.

57-58 Size up London’s weapon selection
Predictably, weapons feature predominantly at the National Army Museum (Royal Hospital Road, SW3; 020 7730 0717/www.national-army-museum.ac.uk). The 2,500 edged weapons, 200 pole arms and 1,850 firearms should keep you interested. Similarly well ‘packed’, the Royal Artillery Museum (Royal Arsenal, SE18; 020 8855 7755/www.firepower.org.uk) covers the history of guns and gunpower from ancient China to contemporary Iraq. Look out for the mortar in the shape of a tiger.

59 Cross the zebra crossing at Abbey Road
You know why. The studio itself (www.abbeyroad.co.uk) is at 3 Abbey Road, NW8.

60 Chill out in Cleaver Square
Just off Kennington Park Road, SE11, this square has been restored using money from the National Lottery. Ideal for a peaceful game of boules or a quiet beer at the Prince of Wales.

61 Get lost over a cocktail in Lost Society
The winner of Time Out’s Best Bar award in 2006 is a sensation Deep-turquoise leather banquettes and cubes line bare brick walls decorated with painted peacocks. The cocktails that demand special attention – our Amaretto Sour was a perfectly blended combo of Disaronno shaken with lemon juice, sugar, bitters and egg white, while a classic vodka martini was top-notch.
Lost Society, 697 Wandsworth Road, SW8 (020 7652 6526/www.lostsociety.co.uk).

62 Visit our last sewer lamp
On Carting Lane, a gloomy side street off the Strand between the Savoy and the ShellMex building, you can find London’s last remaining sewer-powered gas lamp, still giving out its queasy yellow glow around the clock, thanks to a hollow iron column that allows sewer vapours to travel to its flame. Lit by the capital’s slurry since the 1880s, this Patent Sewer Ventilating Lamp represents Victorian ingenuity at its best.

63 Model in the nude
The Bare Facts workshop is designed for aspiring life models. Trot along to classes on Wednesday evenings at Islington Arts Factory (2 Parkhurst Road, N7; 020 7607 0561/www.islingtonartsfactory.org.uk) where you’ll get assessed for basic aptitude and blush factor. Then you pay the £20 to join as a life model, after which the cash comes in as quickly as the clothes come off.

64 Cruise the Tates
As you might expect, even the design of the super-smooth Tate-to-Tate catamaran service operated by Thames Clippers (020 7887 888/ www.tate.org.uk/tatetotate) merits respect. The interior and exterior of the boat are decked out in Damien Hirst’s coloured spots and, at the Tate Britain end, it leaves from the striking steel Millbank pier, designed by architects David Marks and Julia Barfield (also responsible for the London Eye). Buy tickets at either Tate, online, by phone or (subject to availability) onboard. You’ll get a third off with your Travelcard, making a single just £2.85 (£4.30 without).

65 Drink vodka in a Polish bar
Bar Polski (11 Little Turnstile, WC1; 020 7831 9679) is the real deal. From the Polish kitchen (churning out bigos, barszcz and kielbasa until 10pm) to the equally authentic Polish fridge, this sleek and simple bar doesn’t do dilettante. Vodkas by the vatload, most at £2.30 a shot, are categorised into ‘dry and interesting’ or ‘nice and sweet’ to help the uninitiated. Think of them as meze – try a sweet caraway seed Kwinkowy, or an Orzechowka infused with unripe walnuts.

Be a beekeeper

66 Keep bees
Talk to North London Beekeepers (www.beekeeping.org.uk/nl) for information and advice on how to become an urban beekeeper, and tap into the rich nectar resources of London’s many parks and gardens. The organisation offers beginners’ classes, a supervised ‘adopt a hive’ scheme and plenty of sound advice – such as stressing the importance, when it comes to neighbourly relations, of keeping good-tempered bees.

67 Visit a proper transvestite bar
Come Saturday night in the City, business suits are replaced by stilettos and suspenders – but the punters are still men. Time Out meets London’s grass-roots trannies and their mysterious army of male admirers at the Way Out Club. Click here for the full story.

68 Sing along to ‘The Sound of Music’
Most Friday nights, the Prince Charles Cinema hosts ‘Sing-a-Long-a Sound of Music’, a showing of the film especially designed for those who are unable to resist belting out ‘Lonely Goatherd’ at the top of their lungs – usually in fancy dress.
Prince Charles Cinema, Leicester Place, WC2 (020 7494 3654/www.princecharlescinema.com).

69-75 My favourites…
Mark Thomas
The best Lido ever is on Tooting Common (Tooting Bec Rd, SW16; 020 8871 7198). In the summer after the kids finish school on a Friday the whole family heads up there to hang out with friends.

My son and I make the journey to Sister Ray (34-35 Berwick St, W1; 020 7734 3297/www.sisterray.co.uk) on Saturday morning as a treat. It’s a great record shop – everything from The Sonics through to the McClusky offshoot Shooting at Unarmed Men (my son found that). None of your over-priced stuff, either.

After this we go to Lina Stores (18 Brewer St, W1; 020 7437 6482), one of the original Soho Italian delis. The place smells like heaven should: of bread, olives and meat.

Walking the Thames path – from the Thames Barrier through to Tower Bridge – is beautiful and full of surprises: from the statue of Dr Salter and his daughter (the story of one of the first public health campaigners and his daughter is unbelievably sad) through to the cormorants by the defunct Dome.

The Foundry (84-86 Great Eastern St, EC2; 020 7739 6900) is run by mates of mine and is a bar and art gallery. It has a certain squatter chic. They feature all sorts of art; it costs nothing to exhibit but each artist must donate one of their works to the bar. On Friday lunchtimes, Resonance FM runs a live radio show from the bar.

Every last Friday of the month, cyclists meet under Waterloo Bridge at six-ish, for the Critical Mass bike ride. When a sufficient number are ready, the ride heads off into town. The rule is: spread out, slow down and head to where the car traffic is worst. As there is no leader to the route, each ride takes a different way around town. Everyone is there for different reasons: some want to protest against climate change or oil wars, some want more cycle lanes and some want to take part in an anarcho, leaderless carnival. Some just like the exhilaration of hundreds of cycles taking over Park Lane on a summer evening.

Mass Lone Demonstrations (www.markthomasinfo.com) happen on the third Wednesday of the month. The Serious Organised Crime and Police Act requires people to get prior permission from the police if they wish to hold demonstrations in Parliament Square. The ethos of Mass Lone Demos is: if the Government wants to be this petty then let them license a whole bunch of people turning up to demonstrate individually but en masse. It’s legal, it’s fun and it’s a bit annoying to the Government and the police. Hurrah!

Visit an old-school barber

76 Get a proper shave
Geo F Trumper, established in Curzon Street in 1875, has ‘served the needs of London gentlemen and members of the Royal Court for more than 125 years and is still run by a Trumper. A shave here entails getting your face doused in ‘skin food’, wrapped in hot towels, then a cut-throat to the chin, cold towels, a face massage and moisturiser. There’s also a shaving school.
Geo F Trumper, 9 Curzon St, W1 (020 7499 1850/www.trumpers.com).

Go free running

77 Jump London
Free running or parkour (‘the art of moving’) is urban sport at its most unadulterated; few would deny the beauty inherent in its transformation of urban landscapes into arenas for physical expression, or the simplicity of its purpose: to pass obstacles in the fastest and most direct manner possible. Following a boom in parkour’s popularity in the last few years, Paul Corkery established Urban Freeflow (www.urbanfreeflow.co.uk) to promote safe parkour at a time when copycats were launching themselves off multi-storey car parks with abandon. Corkery runs an Urban Freeflow Academy offering two-hour classes on Monday and Friday nights (£5 per session) at the Moberley Sports and Education Centre (101 Kilburn Lane, W10; 020 7641 4807), and a range of advanced classes (£10 per session) around the city on a first-come, first-served basis.

78 Visit Little Ben
Given to London by the French at the time of fine cross-Channel relations in 1892, Little Ben is a little (not that little, at 30-feet tall) brother to our grandest timepiece, Big Ben. Unlike its Westminster sibling, Little Ben sits rather sadly on a traffic island on Victoria Street, SW1.

Count swans

79 Take a gander at swan upping on the Thames
All the swans on the Thames belong either to the Queen or the Vintners’ or Dyers’ livery companies. Every year in the third week of July, starting at Sunbury on July 16 and finishing at Abingdon, Oxfordshire, on July 20, swan uppers count and mark the cygnets. The Dyers’ swans are marked with a nick on one side of the beak; the Vintners’ swans receive a nick on both sides; the Queen’s are left unmarked. The Queen’s Swan Marker duly produces a report on the results. Pure Monty Python.
Visit www.thamesweb.co.uk/windsor/windsor1999/upping.html for more details.

Wapping Food

80 Dine out in a converted power station
At Wapping Food, the dramatic conversion of a hydraulic power station into a restaurant (and associated gallery/performance space) makes no effort to hide the building’s industrial interior – with rusting and peeling pumps, chains and hooks still firmly in place.
Wapping Food, Wapping Wall, E1 (020 7680 2080/www.thewappingproject.com).

81 Pass time at the Clockmakers’ Museum
The eternally punctual will love taking time out to survey the hundreds of ticking and chiming clocks, watches and horological masterpieces at the Clockmakers’ Museum, which opened to the public in 1874. Overseen by the Worshipful Clockmakers’ Company, this is the oldest collection of clocks in existence. Among the celebrity timepieces is the watch Sir Edmund Hillary carried to the top of Everest. The Museum is open Mon-Sat, 9.30am-4.50pm (closed on public holidays).
Clockmakers’ Museum, Guildhall Library, EC2 (020 7332 1868/www.clockmakers.org).

82 Shoot a few hoops in Covent Garden
There are full-size basketball courts in leisure centres all around the capital, but less well-known is the outdoor half-court in the garden of St Giles-in-the-Fields Church (St Giles High St, WC2). Anyone can show up and play.

83 Eat afloat
Lightship Ten (St Katharine Docks, E1; 020 7481 3123/www.lightshipx.com) offers the chance to dine aboard an 1877 Danish lightship, moored among the yachts of St Katharine Docks. What better way to wind down from work than a seat on the deck with a beer or a glass of wine?

Belly Dance

84-87 Belly dance yourself fit
Belly dancing can be soft and sensual or passionate and powerful, and provides a brilliant workout for hips, waist and legs. Jacqueline Chapman (020 8300 7616/www.bellydancer.org.uk) runs classes around London, or you could learn to belly dance at Basement Dance Studio (Basement Units, York House, 400 York Way, N7; 020 7700 7722/www.jumpanddance.com), Danceworks (16 Balderton St, W1; 020 7629 6183/www.danceworks.net) and Greenwich Dance Agency (Borough Hall, Royal Hill, SE10; 020 8923 9741/www.greenwichdance.org.uk).

88 Stand through an opera
Un-seated tickets cost £4 to £9 each. Bargain.
Royal Opera House, Bow St, WC2 (020 7304 4000/www.royaloperahouse.org).

89 Learn to make hats
Rose Cory (Rose Cory Millinery, Shrewsbury House, Bushmoor Crescent, SE18; 020 8856 9190/www.rosecory.co.uk) has been making hats for more than 40 years, and counted the Queen Mother among her many clients. Cory teaches classes to all levels of experience for a very reasonable £35 a day.

90-93 My favourites…
Ken Livingstone
I’ve been eating in Vasco & Piero’s Pavilion (15 Poland St, W1; 020 7437 8774/ www.vascosfood.com) in Soho for donkeys’ years. It’s simple, Umbrian food with a good wine list. Not trendy but incredibly friendly and totally reliable.

I take as many opportunities as I can to visit London Zoo (Outer Circle, Regent’s Park, NW1; 020 7722 3333/www.zsl.org). The Komodo dragons are magnificent and the ‘gorilla kingdom’ is the zoo’s big new arrival of 2007.

I still cannot get over how much Trafalgar Square’s improved since we ended its previous incarnation as a traffic-choked roundabout. The staircase leading up to the north terrace and National Gallery (Trafalgar Square WC2; 020 7747 2885/www.nationalgallery.org.uk) really opens it up.

The garden at El Parador (245 Eversholt St, NW1; 020 7387 2789/www.elparadorlondon.com) is a great place to eat tapas outdoors. You’d never know you were near such busy streets.

94 Sleep over
It would be some people’s worst nightmare, but for us it’s a dream: a sleepover with the mummies in the British Museum (Great Russell St, WC1; 020 7323 8195/www.thebritishmuseum.ac.uk). Sure, the preliminaries are a bit mundane: you need to be (or be responsible for) an eight- to 15-year-old who is a Young Friend of the Museum (£20 per year; see www.thebritishmuseum.ac.uk/friends/index.html for details). You’re then eligible for one of the much-coveted 250-plus places on any of four sleepovers held each year. The £27.50 ticket pays for loads of activities, including storytelling and craft workshops (perhaps making a Greek vase or a mosaic), and gives you the chance to explore the museum. Book well in advance. Similar events are hosted at the Science Museum (Exhibition Rd, SW7; 0870 870 4868/www.sciencemuseum.org.uk) and onboard the Golden Hinde (St Mary Overie Dock, SE1; 0870 011 8700/ www.goldenhinde.org).

Clown around

95 Send in the clowns
Dalston’s Clowns International Gallery Museum (All Saints Centre, E8, 0870 128 4336/www.clownsinternational.com) is crammed with props, photos, costumes… and eggs. Clowns have a code that no two performers can wear the same make-up – eggs act as a record of a clown’s make-up and the gallery holds more than 400, including one belonging to the king of clowns, Grimaldi. The museum opens on the first Friday of every month; admission is free.

96 Get a tattoo
An astonishing 15,000 sailors, heavy metal fans and Hell’s Angels attended the first London Tattoo Convention (www.thelondontattooconvention.com) in 2005. This year’s event’s in October.

97-101 My favourites…
Sarah Waters, author
Lower Marsh has got everything you could want: retro clothes, a fetishwear shop, brilliant bookshop Crockatt & Powell (119-120 Lower Marsh, SE1; 020 7928 0234), a library, jewellers, wholefoods shop and, in Scooterworks Café (132 Lower Marsh, SE1; 020 7620 1421), fabulous Italian coffee and an aloof resident cat.

Candid Café (3 Torrens St, EC1; 020 7837 4237) is a wonderful place to escape to when you’ve had enough of the chain coffee shops of Upper Street. It’s tucked down an atmospheric alley, the food’s good, the chairs are comfy and the camp decor makes you want to stay all day.

Crystal Palace Park (Thicket Rd, SE20) is not by any means the most handsome in London, but the life-size 1850s dinosaur models really make it worth a visit. I wish my house looked like Sir John Soane’s Museum (13 Lincoln’s Inn Fields, WC2; 020 7405 2107). It’s the most eccentric in London, and packed to the rafters with wonderful things.

101 things to do before you leave London