On Saturday (arguably the worst day of the week to head to central London) I jumped on a train destined for the capital. A short tube journey later and I was ready for a day of exploring. Sam and I decided to visit Covent Garden to view their latest Instagram-worthy spots and soak up the Christmas spirit before heading to Winter Wonderland that evening.
Covent Garden is one of those places that until recently I’d always avoided like the plague. It’s got ‘tourist’ written all over it and on the weekends it’s generally crowd-filled and noisy due to the amount of theatres, restaurants and bars in the area. During the week though, it’s got a much better vibe and is a great place to base yourself if you’re staying in the city for longer than one day as it’s so central. There are plenty of hotels near Covent Garden, so you won’t have too far to stumble home after a few too many drinks or an evening show.
We started off by grabbing some lunch at Eat Tokyo. Neither of us had been before, but we were both in the mood for Sushi and it certainly didn’t disappoint. The restaurant is just round the corner from the Duchess Theatre (currently showing the hilarious The Play That Goes Wrong which we saw back in September) as well as the Novello Theatre, and is opposite the Theatre Royal. We chose a range of sushi to tide us over until dinner, and I’d definitely visit again when we’re next in the area.
Next we headed to Covent Garden market for a quick look around. As expected, the market was heaving and so our trip was rather fleeting as neither of us really like being stuck in crowds.
We walked around the markets for a little while, admiring the Christmas lights and having a browse of the stalls. I loved the giant Christmas tree in particular!
I got a few photos and then we headed back towards the station in search of warmth. We wandered in the vague direction of Seven Dials as I wanted to visit Rokit. I went to their Shoreditch store a few years ago in my first year of uni, but this was my first trip to their Covent Garden counterpart. Sam wasn’t overly impressed and I felt their pricing was a little high, so we headed to Costa for a hot chocolate each. I opted for Gingerbread and Cream, whilst Sam chose Black Forest.
Once we’d refuelled, we decided to pop into a few more shops and then head to Winter Wonderland – it’s only 10 minutes on the tube to Hyde Park Corner from Covent Garden so it’s super easy to get to. We had a fab time, though I hope we get to go again this year as it’s my favourite place to visit at Christmas!
I’ve marked out all the places we visited on the map above (with the addition of Inamo, a restaurant we visited a couple of months ago) so you can have a proper look at what we got up to.
Have you visited Covent Garden recently? Will you be visiting before the festive season is over?
