Alex Funk

Feeling the thirst in Waterloo? There are a couple of traditional watering holes that are well worth a visit in the area, including pubs that have survived the centuries to old spots given a new lease of life and a shiny craft beer menu. If brutalist architecture is your bag, then there's a design gem to seek out, too. Get stuck in at Waterloo’s best pubs. RECOMMENDED: These are the best restaurants in Waterloo. 

St Pancras International Station, London’s portal to the land of croissants, only has four more ‘turn-up-and-go’ tours this year and the next two are already fully booked. Like a UK train service being on time, these 90-minute tours only happen once every blue moon. Although you can pre-book large group tours starting at £120 for any time and date, the £10 ‘turn-up-and-go’ showings are designed for individuals and smaller groups. The limited 11am viewings are spread across five Saturdays of 2024 with a special promotion coming up this Saturday (July 6) featuring a bonus slot at 2pm. Unfortunately, these two upcoming events are sold out but the good news is that you can get on board for the final two tours on September 7 and November 2. If you’ve ever confused St Pancras for King’s Cross, you may feel like you’ve already seen everything the station has to offer after walking its perimeter looking for your platform. However, the company that runs the tour – City Highlights – promises ‘informed and entertaining tours of the station’s principal features set in a historical context, with up-to-date knowledge of current works and future plans’. The company is the only official guide endorsed by High Speed 1, the owner of the high-speed railway connecting St Pancras International Station and the Channel Tunnel. You can find more information about the St Pancras International Station guided tours here. Did you know that the V&A is launching a pop-up trail dedicated to Taylor Swift th

There are plenty of great little places kicking about on Brixton Road, and for a while, Café Van Gogh was one of them. Known for serving tasty vegan food from breakfast through dinner, sweet treats and cheeky 2-4-1 margaritas on Thursday nights, this place was at the heart of the community. However, the café has sadly just closed it’s doors.  And the saddest part is that it wasn’t just a great place to go for a bite to eat or a cocktail. Café Van Gogh was a fully-fledged social enterprise which worked hard to transform the lives of 60 adults and young people with learning disabilities by training them in hospitality roles. In 2020, only seven percent of south London adults with a learning disability were employed, according to Mencap. The cafe’s hard work meant that learning-disabled adults and young people gained some independence through it’s training programme and the mentorship of job coaches. While Café Van Gogh was seeking charitable status at the time of closing, the team has just shared an Instagram post detailing that the decision to shut permanently. The reason? It can no longer afford to run. The post cites rising costs due to Brexit and the pandemic; high energy prices and the effects of home working on the lunchtime economy as contributing factors. The post reads: ‘We’ve been compelled to take the incredibly tough decision to close Café Van Gogh, after nine years of trading as a unique vegan social enterprise, which always placed kindness and ethics at the heart

Already seen Buckingham Palace and been on the London Eye? If you’re stuck for ideas on how to spend your time in the city, look no further than this quintessentially British walking tour of London’s pubs, which has been crowned TripAdvisor’s best thing to do in the UK for two years on the trot. The Historical Pub Walking Tour of London came out on top in TripAdvisor’s 2023 and 2024 Travellers’ Choice Awards as the best UK experience in the category. It was also ranked as the 19th overall top experience in the world, as well as coming in fourth place for ‘cultural and historic experiences’. One reviewer who booked the tour this year wrote: ‘The tour guide was absolutely amazing! We had the best time, perfectly paced, not a big history buff but found every fact interesting! One of my favourite things I did in London.’ High praise indeed. If you fancy trying out the (alleged) best experience the UK has to offer, you’ll be in a small guided group hopping between at least four locally loved alehouses for half a day. You’ll sip on local brews, get some sightseeing in, and hear tales of the historical figures who were partial to a pint or two in the very same pubs. The £25 per person pub crawl is run by Liquid History Tours and has earned 3814 five-star reviews on the TripAdvisor website. For the annual Best of the Best awards, reviews and ratings over the past year are analysed to determine which hotels, beaches, attractions and other travel points were of the highest quality, lea