sarah sosiak

Favourite Places - London

View Favourite Places: London in a larger map

I put together maps of some favourite places in various cities for friends planning trips, then heard that they'd found them useful and passed them on, so thought I'd share them more broadly. Click through to the larger maps for details. All are works in progress, I'll keep adding to them as a recall and discover more spots.

One outing I'd recommend in London that's not on the map is a walking tour via London Walks. Yes, it sounds rather tourist-cheesy, but I've been on a few and found them really interesting in a geeky sort of way. Think: Live Discovery/History channel documentary, sometimes with a stop at a pub.

Another thing that's good to know about London is that most of the museums are free, so it's easy to spend an hour's downtime in a single exhibit.

Hungry? Pret a Mangers are everywhere, delicious, reasonably priced and offer fairly healthy breakfast/lunch/snack options. Most have free wifi. Bonus: The one opposite the Leicester Square tube is huge, great for people watching and open late.

London Shadows

Neat. The current Google Maps aerial view of London features nice crisp silhouettes of the buildings along the south bank of the Thames.

Close up of the area around the OXO Building and Tate Modern here.

Update: Another close up, showing the HMS Belfast and Tower Bridge here.

29 000km later…

Update: It was pointed out that my photosets didn't capture some of the highlights of the trip, so now...with more words. (And a map.)

June, from just east of the Baltic to the middle of the Pacific, in pictures.

View Escape the Fog - 2009.06 in a larger map

Helsinki (on Flickr)

Where I fell in love with delicious cardamom pastries, experienced 120 straight hours of daylight, climbed a church to get to the park on its roof, visited the gorgeous Kiasma Museum of Modern Art, wandered the Finnish Museum of National Photography, ate a lot of great tomato-cheese-lettuce-on-rye sandwiches, and explored Suomenlinna, the Swedish-then-Russian-then-Finnish sea fort off the coast of the city.

Tallinn (on Flickr)

Where I fell into conversation with a local, and spent the afternoon wandering the off-the-tourist-track bits of the Old Town talking about heavy metal and life in Estonia.

The UK (on Flickr)

Where I spent quality time with good friends, went geocaching in the woods and accidentally found a film set, took a quick trip to Oxford, saw a Body Worlds exhibit, visited the Cabinet War Rooms, spent an afternoon in my favourite building in London (St. Pancras Station) and discovered the genius in using butternut squash to make a veggie burger.

Hawaii (on Flickr)

Where I spent more quality time with more good friends, climbed the rim of a volcanic crater tuff cone, celebrated Pau Hana on Waikiki beach, went for a moonlit swim in the ocean, visited a Buddhist Temple, surfed, body boarded and ate a lot of fish.