sillywin

Hello everyone,

I need help on planning a 4 days 3 nights trip to London in March 2005. I am going with 2 friends, and we are in our early 30s, first time in London. We will be staying at the Claridge's and Four Seasons London.

Please suggest some restaurants for breakfast and dinner near our hotel.

Should we have afternoon tea at the Ritz or the Claridge's?

m_kingdom2

You're there for three nights and are changing hotels? Are you mad?

It's not "the Claridge's", it's simply "Claridge's". Skip afternoon tea, it's not "so English" it's naff and only for American tourists, if you do see Brits having that kind of tea in London, they're usually from up north.

As for dinner suggestions, grab a Michelin guide, I can't be bothered reciting restaurants when you make no effort in describing what cuisines you enjoy and at what price level.

Stay at Claridge's or the Four Seasons, changing hotels is insanity, grow up.

sillywin

m_kingdom2:

I am not insane about changing hotels. Just want to experience both top rated hotels in London while i am there.

m_kingdom2

It's madness, as anyone would know, you have to stay in an hotel for at least two nights to even begin to fully experience it. That aside, what is the point of having to repack, then unpack just to stay at the Four Seasons, which, in my opinion (and I am very near to both these properties) is overly American and corporate.

Just grow up and stay at Claridge's, or continue with your childish ideas and stay one night at Claridge's, one night at the Four Seasons, then perhaps another night at The Ritz of The Dorchester. All this changing of hotels and you won't even have time to see the sights!

ssachida

sillywin, mk_2 is rude (it's her trademark), but also has a point. Pick one hotel for this trip. You can try out the others on future trips. Use the search function to search for other posts on evening tea, I remember one trip report with a lot of information on this.

radiofanatic

I enjoy seeing mk_2 telling someone to "grow up" when she herself is acting very infantile and rude in her postings. Sillywin, although I would not change hotels myself, if that's what you prefer, enjoy it! I want to tell you that I went to London this past march and it was much chillier than I expected, especially because of wind, so I would plan accordingly. Also, b/c of the wind, my umbrella was rendered useless.

Tulips

I think MK is right that it is strange to change hotels for one night. And in the same area too, unless you are staying in Canary Wharf?
And MK is right about afternoon tea as well.

These are some restaurants near your hotels that I like;
Tamarind for Indian food
Nobu for Japanese
Nicole's in Bond street for lunch (I think they do breakfast too)

Boxwood cafe; a little further, in Knightsbridge (in the Berkeley Hotel; perhaps you could try that for your 3rd night), but very nice for dinner.

Of course you should eat at Gordon Ramsey's restaurant in Claridges too.

flanneruk

As a general rule, the only places you can get edible breakfasts in England are B+Bs or greasy spoons. Neither are thick on the ground in the part of London you'll be staying at, though some people have told me Claridge's is at least imaginative.

The Wolsey is really the only restaurant in the area that takes breakfast seriously. Otherwise, it's either bad pastiches of real food in hotel burnt-to-pointlessness buffets, or junk food like croissants and those stupid sugared-bread-with-chocolate things in every wimpish Mayfair caff.

For a breakfast fit for an Englishman, the Cock Tavern in Smithfield, or most other pubs around it (the seriously girlie Smiths of Smithfield isn't a pub) is about your best bet.

Visiting London without a serious English breakfast, a couple of decent Cantonese lunches, one Punjabi dinner and one Keralan dinner is really missing the point of the world's greatest city (and a few Bombay snacks at a bhel puri house are far more typical of how we manage afteroon munchies than that ridiculous tea nonsense they rip you all off with)

MK2 has it wrong in just one respect: the stuff Michelin rates you can get anywhere. It's proper British food like black puddings, dim sum and aloo chat you should be eating. Or even the exotica, like Ethiopian or Parsee.

radiofanatic

when we went, we solely ate in pubs to get the authentic foods, like fish/chips, shepard's pie, lamburgers, etc. - plus it was less expensive.

m_kingdom2

Firstly let me clarify about the Michelin guide, when I make reference to it, I'm cutting straight to the starred restaurants only, the others, I can't be bothered with going to specifically on their say so.

If it's your first time in London, 4 days is a waste, but you seem to be into wasting so there you are.

ssachida

>If it's your first time in London, 4 days is a waste>

Am curios. How so? Sure it isn't enough time to do a lot, but it's a nice primer ...

ssachida

curious

m_kingdom2

This poster is in Paris for two nights too, they're rushing around and won't see a thing. 3 nights offers you at most three full days (most likely to be two) which isn't long enough for someone coming from America. I certainly wouldn't go to New York for a few nights (well I wouldn't go at all with your new mad immigration queues), I know people do, but it's mad.

Kayb95

Have no fear, sillywin. I have yet in all my trips to London to met anyone even half as rude as MK. Everyone we've ever met in London has far superior social skills and will treat you with civility.

For such a short visit, I would stick to one hotel. You will waste at least 1/2 a day of your touring time switching hotels.

And if you wish to take an afternoon tea, do it. It's your trip - do what you want. Afternoon tea is a lovely way to relax and unwind after a busy day touring. Since your time is limited, you may want to take tea at the hotel (just to save traveling time.)

radiofanatic

I went to london for 4 days, used one of the days for a out of london tour and felt I got a great flavor of london.

LoveItaly

Well, one thing all of us can be greatly for, M_K2 refuses to come across the pond to the good old USA because of immigration queues.
We owe Homeland Security a note of thanks. ><

sillywin

Thanks everyone for your positive suggestion/recommendation EXCEPT m_kingdom2.

rj007

I do not go to London to experience hotels - I go to London to experience London. Since I don't stay in hotels there anymore this isn't a factor.

sillywin, Kaybe95 is right. The vast majority of the people you meet in London are polite and civil. It's your trip so you can do anything you want. As I mentioned in a previous post, I could care less about what other people think of my travels.

You're going to my favorite city - I'm just around the corner from my 8th visit there and I'm still finding plenty of new things to do. I would suggest doing some walks with London Walks - they're good introductions to the neighborhoods of London and the pub walks are fun. Their website walks.com

Another good website toptable.co.uk - they have all kinds of deals at restaurants. Worth a look.

You will have a great time in London. Enjoy your trip!

flanneruk

Kay95:

You must spend your time here in some kind of parallel universe.

MK2 often talks through MK2's hat. But I have yet to find a contribution from MK2 that significantly differed from the normal tone of British conversation. If you think MK2's rude (and I don't), you wouldn't survive a microsecond in most pubs or clubs. And if you've never encountered anyone speaking like MK2, it must be London, Ontario (where, come to think of it, they do all behave a bit like Stepford wives) you've made all those trips to.

MK2 tells it as it looks to MK2. That - and not saccharine platitudes - is the responsible answer to someone asking for advice. And it's also, thank God, the normal way we answer questions in this country.

If the questioner doesn't want to listen, it's the questioner who loses.

obxgirl

flanner_uk, Is mrs. flanner hiding your metamucil again?