We are taking a second trip to London in March 2003. We are interested in taking a couple of guided London walks. Last year we took the Jack the Ripper walk with Donald Rumbelow. We enjoyed the walk but the crowd was too large. Does anyone have any suggestions concerning the best walking tour companies to use? Has anyone taken any of the Haunted London walks? Thanks!

Original London Walks is probably the best overall company - don't worry, none of their other walks are nearly as crowded as the famous Donald. Most of their other walks will have between 5 and 30 in attendance.<BR><BR>And if you pick up Time Out the day you arrive in London, they list several walks by other good companies almost every day of the week.

If you take the Big Bus Tour, included is a walking tour that was quite nice. It leaves from the Bus Stop by the Museum at Trafalgar Sq.<BR><BR>

We have taken two haunted walks w/ www.londonwalks.com. They were great. One in May and one in Sept. Both times crowds were between 20-30 people. Had no problem hearing the guide and enjoyed the tours emensely since I love all things ghostly!

My experience with the Jack the Ripper walk was also not good, due to the huge crowd and the fact we didn't get Donald, but a rather poor substitute. But last summer we did the &quot;Mysterious East End&quot; walk on a Sunday afternoon with Donald Rumbelow and it was fantastic -- about 12 of us -- focusing on the architecture and the events leading up to the Jack the Ripper incidents.

Firstly a declaration of interest: I have a small walking business of my own, based around the ripper.<BR><BR>In my opinion, the London Walks people are about as good as it gets, apart from the ripper (caveat above).<BR><BR>I am amazed how popular the ripper walk is when, in all honesty, it is the worst of the whole programe (not just their's, all of them inc mine).<BR><BR>Go on many walks. Ignore the ripper.

I don't remember if the Jack the Ripper walking tour I did was guided by Donald Rumbelow or not in Sep 2000, but I was a little disappointed (I did several other tours). It's not that the guide didn't know his stuff - it's just that most of the buildings aren't there anymore, so the guide kept stretching to describe what the place had been like at the time. Somehow standing in the spot where it happened didn't impress me now that everything looked a whole lot different.<BR><BR>I would have enjoyed the guide just as much listening to him lecture sitting down back in the states somewhere. Being there didn't add much.<BR><BR>Other walking tours were better, especially the more modern ones. I liked one of the Beatles walking tours I did.<BR><BR>Andrew<BR>

ttt

I took 3 walks with Original London Walks, and all of them were worthwhile. The ones I took were the &quot;Old Hampstead Village&quot; Sunday morning walk; a walk around the South Bank; and also a walk around the Westminster area. <BR><BR>The Hampstead walk was the best. It was also an interesting way to spend a Sunday morning, when almost everything else was closed.<BR><BR>A complete list of the walks is at http://www.walks.com/

We continue to enjoy John Muffty&quot; smaller walking groups. He is very entertaining. I don't think that he has a website but his e-mail address is:<BR>[email protected]

2 of our favorite Original London Walks were ones that weren't really sought out by most tourists: The Lambeth Walk and the Bloomsbury Literary Walk. The Lambeth one was really fascinating as the guide had grown up there in the 40's and 50's and could point out the social and physical changes that had taken place over the past 40 or 50 years.