Topic Wiki

Trip Reports
A Week in London for 2 TR by Davidmal
100,000 Steps by Yuguy
6 Hours in London by Something Fishy
London + Scotland Trip Report by jshelton
London TR by Yehoshua
Mrs. Hvaces42's Surprise London Birthday Adventure by hvaces42
A Trip to See the Queen's Place: dpk4588 Takes on London by dpk4588


Suggested 1 Day Itineraries
1 Day In London by Davidmal
12 Hour Layover by Aaaron
11 Hour Layover by Mootkim

Drivers
Yitzchok: +44 (0) 20 7101 3535 - 8 Seater New VW Transporter (spacious).
Heathrow Drop-off 75GBP Pick up: 85GBP (plus 25GBP and he brings 8 Danishes to the airport too)
Hourly 65GBP
Daily 475GBP
Very Reliable, very nice and funny guy. Frum, professional and has taken very good care of my client - RCARentals (FlightBlitz).
Emmes Car Service (Stamford Hill) +44 20 8809 4444
Darkei Noam Car Share +44 20 8800 5566
Hotels
General Hotels
NameAreaWebsite          Review
Andaz Liverpool StreetCity               Link
Hyatt Regency London - The Churchill              West EndLinkmguy
Marriott - Grosvenor SquareWest End               Link
Marriott Marble ArchWest End               Link5 minute walk to Western Marble Arch Synagogue

Hotels in Jewish Areas
NameAreaWebsite          Review     Notes
Croft Court Hotel                                   Golders Green          Link
Holiday Inn Brent Cross                                  Golders Green          Link
Holiday Inn Express                                   Golders Green          LinkKosher breakfast, Shabbos meals. Contact hotel for more info.
King Solomon Hotel          Golders GreenLink
Nox HotelGolders GreenLinklocated near Shuls/kosher restaurants/underground station
KipAccomGolders GreenLinkrun by a frum guy. Individual rooms for rent.
Park Avenue HotelStamford HillLinkFormerly Kadimah
The Pillar HotelHendonLink

Restaurants
NameLocationTypeHechsher     Notes
86 BistroHendonMeatLBDCLOSED
AsadoStamford HillMeatKED'Mediterranean bistro'
AvivEdgwareMeatKF
Ayelets Catering and DelicatessenHendonDeli/Takeout/ShabbosLBDMoroccan Style
Balady AlaeshGolders Green+High BarnetFalafel/ShawarmaSKA
BalaganBorehamwoodMeatLBDMiddle Eastern
Bagel BarHendonCafèLBD
Bagel Bar GrillHendonMeatLBD
Beit CafeGolders GreenDairyLBDNEW
BooyaGolders GreenIce CreamNEW
Bread BakeryGolders GreenBakery/CaféLBDGreat salad selection!
Burger BarGolders GreenMeatLBD
Cafe AromeEdgwareDairyRESCLOSED
Dagim - Fish&ChipsStamford HillFresh fried fishKEDTake away only - No seating
DarnaGolders GreenMeatKFIsraeli inspired. Formerly Soyo Diner.
DelicatessenHampsteadMeatKFMediterranean & regular options
Deli98Stamford HillDeli/Takeout/ShabbosKEDGreat pulled beef sandwich
FlipsideGolders GreenCLOSED
Eli’s Pizza Borehamwood+EdgwarePizzaLBD
Habiba’s DeliGolders Green+HampsteadMeatLBD
Head RoomGolders GreenCaféKFsocial enterprise café by mental health charity Jami
Hot CutGolders GreenMeatKFMeat Sandwiches etc
Hummus BarGolders Green+HendonMeatLBDHighly reccomended - reserve well in advance.
Isola BellaGolders GreenDairy/Fish/ThaiLBDCLOSED
KaifengHendonChineseLBD
KanteenGolders Green/HendonDairy/FishKFInside Brent Cross Shopping Center
La FiestaGolders GreenMeatLBDArgentinian steakhouse.
MaximGolders GreenDairyKED
MazalCamden TownMiddle Eastern MeatKF NEW
Met-Su-YanGolders Green+EdgwareAsianKF
Mr BakerHendonCafé/BakeryLBDSame location as Mr Falafel and Mr Neapolitan
Mr FalafelHendonLBDNextdoor Mr Baker - uses their seating
Mr NeapolitanHendonPizza/PastaLBDInside Mr Baker. Best artisanal pizza in town!
NovellinoGolders GreenDairyLBD
Novellino BistroGolders GreenMeatLBD
One AshbourneGolders GreenMeatKF50% off steaks on Sundays & Tuesdays
PitaGolders GreenMiddle Eastern MeatKFShawarma/Falafel/Schnitzel etc
PizazaGolders GreenPizzaKFCool on screen ordering at table. Delicious foodSee inside the shop!
PizazaHendonPizzaKFNo screens, and smaller than GG.
PizazaEdgwarePizzaKFHas a playroom for kids
Pizza ShaiHendonPizzaSKA
PortoberryHendonHealth Food/DairyLBDAcai bowls, Poke bowls, Bubble tea, Frozen yogurt etcNEW
Reich'sGolders GreenDeli/Takeout/ShabbosKED
Reuben'sWest EndMeatSKADeli upstairs-Restaurant downstairs
SababaBorehamwoodDairyLBD
SliceGolders GreenPizzaLBDNew York style pizza
SoYoGolders Green+EdgwareDairy/FishKFGood breakfast selection
Sami'sGolders GreenSchwarmaLBDThere are Hendon & Edgware locations as well.
Satmar DeliStamford HillDeli/Takeout/ShabbosKED
Shefa MehadrinGolders GreenDeli/Takeout/ShabbosVarious
Sushi HavenGolders GreenSushiLBDAlso have counter inside Kosher Kingdom
TaboonGolders GreenFalafelLBD
The KitchenEdgwareMeatKFCLOSED
TishBelsize ParkMeatLBDOpen for Shabbos meals
Tony PageWesminsterMeatLBDFine Dining - near  Hyde Park
Tuk TukGolders GreenPan-AsianLBD
White FishHendonFishLBD CLOSED
White House ExpressHendonMeatLBD

London food instagram account for pictures of the food click here!



CLICK HERE for many more bakeries, groceries etc.

Hechsherim Key - As always, AYLOR.

KF - Federation of Synagogues

KED - Kedassia - Local "Heimish" Hechsher

LBD - London Beth Din

SKA - Sephardi Kashrut Authority

RES - Rabbi Eliezer Schneebalg - Machzikei Hadas Edgware





Landmarks & Attractions
You can get 2 for 1 entrance on many of the top attractions by using a railway ticket for travel. (Or just by buying a cheap railway ticket and not traveling). See all the details here: http://www.toptiplondon.com/places-to-visit/2-for-1-offers
AttractionURLNotes
Abbey RoadLink     Famous Abbey Road crossing for Beatles fans.
British LibraryLinkBritain's national library, which houses some fascinating collections including these.
Buckingham PalaceLinkPalace tours only in Aug-Sep. Details for Changing of the Guard here. This tour walks along with the guards from the beginning of their march to the palace and then will get you a nice view of the actual ceremony. 10% off code: FUNGUARD10PC
City CruisesLinkSightseeing cruise on the River Thames.
Harrods of KnightsbridgeLinkLargest department store in Europe, with some really cool (expensive!) stuff on display.
HMS BelfastLinkMuseum on a former battleship.
Horse Guards ParadeLink
Imperial War MuseumLinkHighlights: Holocaust Exhibition, Trench Experience
London EyeLink
Old BaileyLinkWatch criminal trials taking place.
Shakespeare TheatreLink
The ShardLinkView London from the viewing gallery or have drinks at the bar on the 52nd floor. Best time to go is twilight/evening. Possibly a better alternative to the London Eye.
StonehengeLinkPrehistoric monument.
Thames RibLinkHigh-speed RIB boat tour.
Tower of London                             Link     Historic fortress where the Crown Jewels can be viewed.
WB Harry Potter Studio Tour      LinkSee Hogwarts, Diagon Alley etc. See here for a tip on finding last-minute availability
Windsor CastleLinkHistorical castle, and the Queen's weekend home.



General Information

Emergency Numbers
Police/Fire/Amb - 999
Hatzolah NW - 0300 999 4 999 (Golders Green/Hendon)
Shomrim - 0300-999-0123

-If you plan on using public transportation, get an Oyster card. They are much cheaper and easier to use than conventional travel cards, and never expire. They can be bought in many stores in London, or online. These days one can use contactless credit cards instead of Oyster.(Check here to see if your foreign contactless card will work.)

-Here is a handy planner for the public transport system.

-DD's Kosher Sandwiches can be bought in most major airports and stations and at some supermarkets around London.  Check here for a list of locations.

-Kosher in the West End/City -
Selfridges food hall has a variety of kosher groceries and prepackaged ready food by 1701.
Hermolis  also have a deli counter there.  The range includes schnitzels, spring rolls, kebabs, breaded lamb chops, chicken wings, fish products and salads. Traditional Shabbat dishes will be on sale on Thursdays and Fridays. Supervision is provided by the Kashrut Division London Beth Din
In the City Munch'n'Crunch have a stand in Hatton Garden with kosher meals, sandwiches, sushi and coffee. It is located at 32 Hatton Garden, on the lower-ground floor of Jewellery Emporium. There is also Mincha there at 1:30.

-Kosher food at non-kosher hotels, restaurants etc. can be ordered from the following kosher caterers in London. They provide double-wrapped meals to any location and could also match the menu of your location.
Hermolis (KED/LBD)
Royal Cuisine (KED/LBD)
1701/Adafina (LBD)

Zmanim - MyZmanim London

Minyanim - There are many shuls all over London, however there are a couple of places that have more constant Minyanim throughout the day.

Golders Green
General Golders Green Mincha/Maariv times
Hagers (Beth Yisochor Dov Beth Hamedrash)
R' Chuna's (Beth Shmuel Synagogue)

Stamford Hill
Satmar 26 (Clapton Common)
Pinters
Biala Shul (47 Moundfield Rd, London N16 6DT, UK)
Here is a list of addresses and zmanim for the above, and other places.

-Minyan in the West End could be found at the Marble Arch Synagogue. Shacharis during the week is followed by breakfast, and a kiddush on Shabbos.

-Most food products in general stores do not have a hechsher on them. This does not necessarily mean they are not kosher. For example, Coca-Cola does not have a hechsher, but it is kosher. Here is an online kosher product search that could help. Link to Android app.

« Last edited by yitzy93 on December 27, 2023, 09:02:39 PM »

Author Topic: London Master Thread  (Read 747553 times)

Offline Yehoshua

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1400 on: March 10, 2016, 08:32:32 AM »
And when you wake up vesikin Shabbos morning, what are you doing the whole day that you don't consider it "wasting"?
I don't consider it a waste to have time to learn in the morning and spend time with family in the afternoon, especially in the winter when the afternoon is so short.

Offline D93

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1401 on: March 10, 2016, 08:39:46 AM »
I don't consider it a waste to have time to learn in the morning and spend time with family in the afternoon, especially in the winter when the afternoon is so short.

והשנה משובחת ;)

Offline Yehoshua

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1402 on: March 10, 2016, 08:52:15 AM »
והשנה משובחת ;)
תלמוד תורה כנגד כולם

Offline ad120

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1403 on: March 10, 2016, 09:43:10 AM »
תלמוד תורה כנגד כולם
שבת יום מונחה

Offline Yehoshua

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1404 on: March 10, 2016, 09:48:18 AM »
שבת יום מונחה
אפשר לקיים שניהם

Offline MC

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1405 on: March 10, 2016, 07:38:50 PM »
Around what time will Shabbos come in/out the weekend of 11/25/16?

Offline yitrap

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1406 on: March 10, 2016, 07:55:43 PM »

Around what time will Shabbos come in/out the weekend of 11/25/16?

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1407 on: March 11, 2016, 10:44:50 AM »
I decided i want to briefly talk about my trip to London just over two years ago.
My wife and I were planning our first miles trip ever.  We wanted to go to Israel because her sister was their for the year, and I said since we have enough miles to go somewhere else also, let's go somewhere in Europe, we decided on London.
We used 75,000 AA points.  Itinerary was JFK BA-LHR economy, 11 hour stopover overnight in London, LHR-TLV. 13 days in Israel. TLV-LHR-All on miles.  We needed return tickets back home, so we bought the cheapest tickets possible on cheapoair.com-LHR-MAD-JFK.  We went out of our way to get back home, but we were rookies at the game.
Two and a half weeks before our trip, Dan posted the Delta glitch to LA and Hawaii.  For a minute I was considering getting them both-my wife had a good friend getting married in LA where my wife was going to be a bridesmaid, and we always wanted to go to Hawaii.  I was too happy about finally booking a trip on miles, that I just said, nah...big mistake.  At the time I had a bad hourly paying job, so I could technically have taken off for as long as I wanted whenever I wanted, so I should have gotten those glitch tickets in addition to our planned trip to Israel and London; gam zu ltova.
So we burnt all of the miles that my wife/father in law had from his AA business card, so we decided to book the hotels with cash.
My wife and I had our discover student cashback cards, and hotels.com was having a promotion with discover for extra cashback, so for our overnight stopover on the way to Israel, I booked the Sheraton LHR with my discover, and for our 6 nights in London at the end of the trip, I used my wife's discover to book the Holiday Inn Brent Cross.  I chose the HIBC because it is on the outskirts of the Brent Cross Jewish community and right by golders green.
We landed in LHR for the stopover night and opted to take a cab to the hotel, we figured it would be a short and cheap ride rather than waiting for a bus.  Turns out, there are two LHR Sheratons, we went to the wrong one.  Not to worry, we got to the right one.  The hotel was nice and updated.
We woke up a few hours later to catch our flight to TLV.  LHR is so different than JFK.  Before going through security, there is an enclosed glass case of weapons, real weapons, kind of cool.  Once you get through security, you are in the common area of the terminal.  All of the shops are closed until 8 in the morning, I never saw airport shops closed before.  When we were ready to board, we went through a special door that took us to a confined area with literally 5 chairs for nobody to sit on, not good for people who are cluster phobic. Over there you can check in your carry on bags for free which actually helped because we were traveling heavy for a three week trip.
BA flight was great, brand new plane.  Of course the crazy chassidim that hold up the el al flights managed to be on our flight as well.
13 days in Israel.
TLV back to LHR was nice.  There was a family of 30 chassidim that help up the flight, but no biggy.  When landing, I had an issue with taking out cash.  Long story short, in Israel I made the biggest mistake of my life, renting a car with a debit card, all of the money that I had for the trip was in my checking account, but AVIS had yet to return it to me, they said they sent a fax to VISA for a refund, whatever that means. I had my savings card with me, but it was not a chip technology card, so I couldn't withdraw the money.  So we had one cell phone and no money at the airport.  So DW went to a different floor with her credit card and did a cash advance/exchange in order to get money just to get to the hotel.  The one phone and lack of money that first night led to a rocky start of the last leg of our trip.  We took an insanely expensive cab to HIBC as it was late and we were exhausted.  My wife paid off some of her AMEX so we would have some money right away being that we weren't planning on using CC's on this trip, and we put some extra cash on all of our cards and called the U.S banks to let them know that we were travelling.
The next morning we took the hotel's free shuttle to the underground.  We caught our tour bus at piccadilly circus, and we toured the city for the day.  The day was cold, bad day to sit on the upper level of a double decker bus.  We got off to see some sights.  Tried finding some kosher food, finally found a krispy kream and a starbucks (starbucks is insanely expensive.)  Then we took the underground to golders green for dinner.  I do not remember the name of the restaurants we went to in Golders greed, but we went to a shwarma place, and two dairy places, all of which were good.  My wife happened to have bumped into her sisters old friend that lives in Italy in the golders green train station, talk about random.
The next day we took the underground back to the city.  We went to see changing of the guard, very easy to lose your travel companion there.  It was nice, but nothing that out of the ordinary.  We then hopped onto a different tour bus from the same company because we got a second day free pass, and saw other parts of the city.  We took a free boat ride that also came with our tour bus tickets, but it got so rainy that it just wasn't worth it.  We had to take the underground back to the main part of the city.  We walked to Rubins for dinner which was fantastic.  It's a kosher place in the middle of muslimville.  We then walked to piccadilly circus and saw the show We Will Rock You.  The show was not as great as I expected.  We bought the tickets for the show at the underground, they urge you to buy the tickets asap before the show sells out.  This theater was not like the typical broadway theater where every seat is sold out, they were lucky if 20% of the seats were sold.
The next day we took a cab to Harry Potter Studios, this was the highlight of our trip.  This isn't just good for the book lovers, it is really for the movie lovers.  We had a rock n roll history tour scheduled back in London, but we missed the tour.  We spent the rest of the day strolling around the city.  We went to Harrots and had some tea.  We went back to golders green for dinner.
Thenext day was friday, and since it was the winter, we decided to take it easy and prepare for shabbos.  We got some brunch, and then we went to a take out place and got 2 big meals for shabbos.
Shabbos came, and the food was just terrible, I mean so bad.  I walked to the minyan factory shul in Brent Cross for minyanim.  Motzai shabbos, we went to the brent cross mall and then we decided to take a walk into Brent Cross because over shabbos I saw that they had a main street with a huge kosher supermarket and kosher restaurants; we could have went there the whole time instead of golders green.  We got shwarma for dinner and picked up some food for our flights the next day.  We walked by the underground station and saw that cabs to LHR were 40 pounds as opposed to the deal we made with the other cab driver who originally took us from the airport which would have been a whopping 100 pounds.  We cancelled the original guy and booked this other company.
We left the hotel at 4AM and went to the airport.  We checked in our bags, but they only gave us one boarding pass, WTH?!  The agent didn't accept our credit cards because they didn't have chip technology (no cards in the U.S did January 2014), so they said we need to pay cash.  We went to the cash exchange place to do that same credit card cash advanced shtick again.  They were so nice there.  They did not understand why the agents were so rude.  They did their best to give us the best rate they could.  Finally it was off to MAD then to JFK.
The BA flight to MAD did not have an entertainment system which was a bummer, but we fell asleep the whole time.  In MAD, people looked at me funny b/c of my yarmulkah.  A muslim even stopped in his tracks and put two fists up at me to try to start a fist fight, but I kept walking.  Our flight was Iberia to JFK.  We also had an el al connecting plane on our flight which was nice; several people coming back from shana bet.  Iberia's plane was so beautiful.
We finally made it back to NY, not sure if I will head back to London with all of the bad experiences that I had there.  When Dan posts a glitch, take the glitch

Offline Zevi16

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1408 on: March 12, 2016, 01:46:30 PM »


I decided i want to briefly talk about my trip to London just over two years ago.  Tried finding some kosher food, finally found a krispy kream and a starbucks (starbucks is insanely expensive.) 

Nice TR. Where is there a kosher Krispy kream?

Offline MeirS

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1409 on: March 12, 2016, 07:33:17 PM »
I decided i want to briefly talk about my trip to London just over two years ago.
My wife and I were planning our first miles trip ever.  We wanted to go to Israel because her sister was their for the year, and I said since we have enough miles to go somewhere else also, let's go somewhere in Europe, we decided on London.
We used 75,000 AA points.  Itinerary was JFK BA-LHR economy, 11 hour stopover overnight in London, LHR-TLV. 13 days in Israel. TLV-LHR-All on miles.  We needed return tickets back home, so we bought the cheapest tickets possible on cheapoair.com-LHR-MAD-JFK.  We went out of our way to get back home, but we were rookies at the game.
Two and a half weeks before our trip, Dan posted the Delta glitch to LA and Hawaii.  For a minute I was considering getting them both-my wife had a good friend getting married in LA where my wife was going to be a bridesmaid, and we always wanted to go to Hawaii.  I was too happy about finally booking a trip on miles, that I just said, nah...big mistake.  At the time I had a bad hourly paying job, so I could technically have taken off for as long as I wanted whenever I wanted, so I should have gotten those glitch tickets in addition to our planned trip to Israel and London; gam zu ltova.
So we burnt all of the miles that my wife/father in law had from his AA business card, so we decided to book the hotels with cash.
My wife and I had our discover student cashback cards, and hotels.com was having a promotion with discover for extra cashback, so for our overnight stopover on the way to Israel, I booked the Sheraton LHR with my discover, and for our 6 nights in London at the end of the trip, I used my wife's discover to book the Holiday Inn Brent Cross.  I chose the HIBC because it is on the outskirts of the Brent Cross Jewish community and right by golders green.
We landed in LHR for the stopover night and opted to take a cab to the hotel, we figured it would be a short and cheap ride rather than waiting for a bus.  Turns out, there are two LHR Sheratons, we went to the wrong one.  Not to worry, we got to the right one.  The hotel was nice and updated.
We woke up a few hours later to catch our flight to TLV.  LHR is so different than JFK.  Before going through security, there is an enclosed glass case of weapons, real weapons, kind of cool.  Once you get through security, you are in the common area of the terminal.  All of the shops are closed until 8 in the morning, I never saw airport shops closed before.  When we were ready to board, we went through a special door that took us to a confined area with literally 5 chairs for nobody to sit on, not good for people who are cluster phobic. Over there you can check in your carry on bags for free which actually helped because we were traveling heavy for a three week trip.
BA flight was great, brand new plane.  Of course the crazy chassidim that hold up the el al flights managed to be on our flight as well.
13 days in Israel.
TLV back to LHR was nice.  There was a family of 30 chassidim that help up the flight, but no biggy.  When landing, I had an issue with taking out cash.  Long story short, in Israel I made the biggest mistake of my life, renting a car with a debit card, all of the money that I had for the trip was in my checking account, but AVIS had yet to return it to me, they said they sent a fax to VISA for a refund, whatever that means. I had my savings card with me, but it was not a chip technology card, so I couldn't withdraw the money.  So we had one cell phone and no money at the airport.  So DW went to a different floor with her credit card and did a cash advance/exchange in order to get money just to get to the hotel.  The one phone and lack of money that first night led to a rocky start of the last leg of our trip.  We took an insanely expensive cab to HIBC as it was late and we were exhausted.  My wife paid off some of her AMEX so we would have some money right away being that we weren't planning on using CC's on this trip, and we put some extra cash on all of our cards and called the U.S banks to let them know that we were travelling.
The next morning we took the hotel's free shuttle to the underground.  We caught our tour bus at piccadilly circus, and we toured the city for the day.  The day was cold, bad day to sit on the upper level of a double decker bus.  We got off to see some sights.  Tried finding some kosher food, finally found a krispy kream and a starbucks (starbucks is insanely expensive.)  Then we took the underground to golders green for dinner.  I do not remember the name of the restaurants we went to in Golders greed, but we went to a shwarma place, and two dairy places, all of which were good.  My wife happened to have bumped into her sisters old friend that lives in Italy in the golders green train station, talk about random.
The next day we took the underground back to the city.  We went to see changing of the guard, very easy to lose your travel companion there.  It was nice, but nothing that out of the ordinary.  We then hopped onto a different tour bus from the same company because we got a second day free pass, and saw other parts of the city.  We took a free boat ride that also came with our tour bus tickets, but it got so rainy that it just wasn't worth it.  We had to take the underground back to the main part of the city.  We walked to Rubins for dinner which was fantastic.  It's a kosher place in the middle of muslimville.  We then walked to piccadilly circus and saw the show We Will Rock You.  The show was not as great as I expected.  We bought the tickets for the show at the underground, they urge you to buy the tickets asap before the show sells out.  This theater was not like the typical broadway theater where every seat is sold out, they were lucky if 20% of the seats were sold.
The next day we took a cab to Harry Potter Studios, this was the highlight of our trip.  This isn't just good for the book lovers, it is really for the movie lovers.  We had a rock n roll history tour scheduled back in London, but we missed the tour.  We spent the rest of the day strolling around the city.  We went to Harrots and had some tea.  We went back to golders green for dinner.
Thenext day was friday, and since it was the winter, we decided to take it easy and prepare for shabbos.  We got some brunch, and then we went to a take out place and got 2 big meals for shabbos.
Shabbos came, and the food was just terrible, I mean so bad.  I walked to the minyan factory shul in Brent Cross for minyanim.  Motzai shabbos, we went to the brent cross mall and then we decided to take a walk into Brent Cross because over shabbos I saw that they had a main street with a huge kosher supermarket and kosher restaurants; we could have went there the whole time instead of golders green.  We got shwarma for dinner and picked up some food for our flights the next day.  We walked by the underground station and saw that cabs to LHR were 40 pounds as opposed to the deal we made with the other cab driver who originally took us from the airport which would have been a whopping 100 pounds.  We cancelled the original guy and booked this other company.
We left the hotel at 4AM and went to the airport.  We checked in our bags, but they only gave us one boarding pass, WTH?!  The agent didn't accept our credit cards because they didn't have chip technology (no cards in the U.S did January 2014), so they said we need to pay cash.  We went to the cash exchange place to do that same credit card cash advanced shtick again.  They were so nice there.  They did not understand why the agents were so rude.  They did their best to give us the best rate they could.  Finally it was off to MAD then to JFK.
The BA flight to MAD did not have an entertainment system which was a bummer, but we fell asleep the whole time.  In MAD, people looked at me funny b/c of my yarmulkah.  A muslim even stopped in his tracks and put two fists up at me to try to start a fist fight, but I kept walking.  Our flight was Iberia to JFK.  We also had an el al connecting plane on our flight which was nice; several people coming back from shana bet.  Iberia's plane was so beautiful.
We finally made it back to NY, not sure if I will head back to London with all of the bad experiences that I had there.  When Dan posts a glitch, take the glitch
Sorry that you had some rough experiences.
The Jewish neighborhood that your referring to is probably Hendon. Hendon is attached to Golders Green and considered by some as one neighborhood. Brent Cross isn't much of a neighborhood. The shopping mall is on the outskirts of Hendon.

What exactly happened to your boarding passes in LHR?

£100 is indeed a rip off for an airport run from NW London to LHR. £40 is much more reasonable.

Offline MC

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1410 on: March 14, 2016, 02:03:37 PM »
Trying to figure out if two half-days in November are enough to experience LHR (landing Thursday around noon, and Shabbos begins around 4 pm on Friday).
Personally, I've spent over a week there already. Though it will be his first time there, DH has zero interest in anything remotely museum or Harry Potter related. We don't have the time for a trip to Stonehenge or Windsor, and I can't seem to find the changing of the guard schedule so early in advance.

So I'm thinking:
Thursday (after landing, getting to the hotel, and resting up a drop): Walk around the general Big Ben/Westminster/Trafalgar Sq./Hyde Park area, either go on the London Eye or Shard, and then dinner.
Friday: either Buckingham Palace and changing of the guard (assuming it happens) and/or Tower of London

Anything else one MUST do?

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1411 on: March 14, 2016, 02:05:31 PM »
Trying to figure out if two half-days in November are enough to experience LHR (landing Thursday around noon, and Shabbos begins around 4 pm on Friday).
Personally, I've spent over a week there already. Though it will be his first time there, DH has zero interest in anything remotely museum or Harry Potter related. We don't have the time for a trip to Stonehenge or Windsor, and I can't seem to find the changing of the guard schedule so early in advance.

So I'm thinking:
Thursday (after landing, getting to the hotel, and resting up a drop): Walk around the general Big Ben/Westminster/Trafalgar Sq./Hyde Park area, either go on the London Eye or Shard, and then dinner.
Friday: either Buckingham Palace and changing of the guard (assuming it happens) and/or Tower of London

Anything else one MUST do?
Without museums, time, or HP, the only other thing I can think of are the London Dungeons if that's interesting to you, but I've personally never been.

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1412 on: March 14, 2016, 02:19:32 PM »
You CAN do Windsor Castle on Thursday (its 20 minutes from LHR) and if the changing of the guard is on even days in November you can catch that around 11am. If you hire a reliable driver you can have him take your luggage to its destination and uber back from Windsor at a reasonable price. We did that.
Fair warning - Any PMs sent in response to forum posts are fair game for ridicule in public.

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1413 on: March 14, 2016, 02:38:05 PM »
DH has zero interest in anything remotely museum related.
So I guess that rules out Harrod's?

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1414 on: March 14, 2016, 02:39:24 PM »
So I guess that rules out Harrod's?
His face when I tried describing that as an attraction -> Priceless

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1415 on: March 14, 2016, 02:40:52 PM »
His face when I tried describing that as an attraction -> Priceless
POIDH  :P

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1416 on: March 14, 2016, 02:44:23 PM »
His face when I tried describing that as an attraction -> Priceless
lol

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1417 on: March 21, 2016, 06:32:10 AM »

Nice TR. Where is there a kosher Krispy kream?

It was in a train station near the london dungeon

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1418 on: March 21, 2016, 06:34:35 AM »
Sorry that you had some rough experiences.
The Jewish neighborhood that your referring to is probably Hendon. Hendon is attached to Golders Green and considered by some as one neighborhood. Brent Cross isn't much of a neighborhood. The shopping mall is on the outskirts of Hendon.

What exactly happened to your boarding passes in LHR?

£100 is indeed a rip off for an airport run from NW London to LHR. £40 is much more reasonable.

They finally gave us the other boarding pass.  They wouldn't accept our credit card because it wasn't chip technology, so we did a cash advance by the money exchange place and had to pay the fees in order to get some cash.
It happens to be that I learned about chip technology in credit cards on this trip and was told that credit cards in america will be switching over also (which they have since)

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Re: London Master Thread
« Reply #1419 on: March 21, 2016, 06:42:07 AM »
It was in a train station near the london dungeon
What kashrus? Not testing I'm genuinely curious
Never knew of it