Hacker News Reader

Comment by lbreakjai | Hacker News Reader

Oh and it's also the least spontaneous place I've lived in. All the food in the world, but you can't really just decide to try something, because everyone knows about the place, and they don't do bookings anyway, and everything is packed all the time, so there's an hour and a half queue to get in, after which you'll be granted a generous 35 minutes to eat before being softly nudged out by the waiter.

This is probably good enough for the anglosaxons or the nordics, but food is just a small part of what makes a good dining experience.

View on HN

Yeah my biggest problem with London is how it seems to lack a real spontaneous street food culture, especially compared to New York, Paris, or Istanbul (which is particularly great at this.)

I spent a couple days walking 40+ km around the city and usually I just ended up eating at Istu or Greggs or one of those similar chains. The same thing in NYC or Paris gets you an infinitely better food experience.

It seems like a great city to be rich and have dinner reservations though.

40+km, every day? Or even if total, it's a proper distance. I'm fascinated by that. Do you just walk around randomly or do you plan things you want to see ?

Walking is imo one of the big "secret" ways to get to know a city. I fondly recall just getting lost on purpose in major cities, and at the end of the day take a taxi, or bus, or tuk-tuk back to the place I was staying. So many things seen, and tried, and random people encountered from all walks of life, it's one of the best things.

Yeah I was doing a challenge of walking entirely across the city, from Woolwich to Heathrow. I think I made it to about Chiswick before my phone died and it was too dark to keep recording on my GoPro. So maybe 30-35k or so that day, and another 20k or so the day before and after just exploring the city more informally.

Agreed that walking is the best way to see a city, for sure. I have done similar one day walks across Brooklyn, Manhattan, etc. and always really enjoy the experience. Usually I have a kind of set goal, like “walk entirely across X place.” I think in Istanbul though I mostly just wandered for 100km (over the course of a week.)

This past summer I walked about 124km around Paris over 5-6 days, going in a spiral through all the arrondissements. That was a great way to discover some new neighborhoods.

Man, we would get along.

I completely agree, it's fantastic both for general fitness, and as a way of exploring. I do this on a smaller scale on a daily basis, walking the 8-10 km route to or from my work (when we have office days). This is walkable in about 1.5 hours, public transport would get me home in around 45 minutes, so I am not really investing much extra time. Varying the route slightly keeps things interesting, and you get a surprising variety with small (1 to 2 street) changes.

Another favourite of mine is cycling around a neighbourhood to get to know it; you get a totally different feel for things than from a car - things typically go by slower, and you are somehow just far more able to observe things.

What the hell are you doing wrong? I never eat the same thing twice in London?!?

But are the places you’re eating 1) fairly affordable and 2) quick / fast food and not a proper sit down restaurant?

I had an extremely difficult time finding places with those requirements. Everything seemed to require sitting down for at least 20-30 minutes, which didn’t fit my walking schedule.

I didn’t have the same problem in NYC or Paris, where it’s very easy to find a variety of places to grab a kebab, baguette sandwich, pizza slice, dumplings, etc.

Yeah definitely affordable and quick. And can get all of those in London with zero effort. Most of the time I just search for food on Google Maps and pick something which doesn't look poisonous.

For example, going here tomorrow at lunch time https://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/food-and-drink/southbank-c... - will work out what I'll eat when I get there.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com