Awesome Things to do in London with Older Kids

Our day trip to London with my teenage son: where we see the Roman Wall hidden in a car park, ride the buses and tubes, visit a couple of John Lewis stores and cafes, IKEA Oxford Street and as many CEX shops as possible! Plus a terrifying Santander bike ride across Tower Bridge.

Perfect family outing for older kids and teens!

Awesome Things to do in London with Older Kids



TRANSCRIPT: (CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE)

THIS IS THE TRANSCRIPT - CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE!

We've just ordered. Uhoh. We need to find an emergency exit. Seriously, don't. Let's get out. Just get out. Hello. Welcome back to the channel where I try new things to make your family happy. And the thing I'm trying today is trying to find things to do with a teenager here in London. Uh we haven't got long. Uh, so we're going to see how many random things we can do in one day here in the capital. It's tricky cuz we come up quite often. So, it's it's we're trying to find new things. So, I think we're going to try some new things today and you can come along with us and we're going to score each one as we go. Uh, I just need to not get killed by some traffic. So, the first place we've stopped at is this. It's the London Centre. And uh score out of 10 for a teenage visit, what would you give it? Four. A four. Oh, that's that's okay. That's higher than I thought. It's pretty cool cuz we actually came here for the toilets. So, I've got I've got a toilet map. I've got a link to a map of toilets around London. It's absolutely crucial for me. It used to be crucial for the kids, but actually it's crucial for me now cuz I'm constantly of my of a certain age. Anyway, this is the London Centre. It's is on the side of Guildhall. And Guildhall is like the the council offices for the Corporation of London, the city of London. It's like their headquarters. In the in the basement or just to the side here, they've got the London Centre and they've got this model of London. I think there's some kind of architectural uh exhibition and you can see all of London at this scale. I don't know what scale it is. It's probably on the sign that I'm showing as a closeup. Which one are you talking about? The wood. The small one. Yeah. 1 to 2,000. Oh, thank you. 1 to 2,000. That was fun to see London as a wei London. A tiny we London. Um, but also I managed to find a little wee model of the tower block that I lived in in King's Cross. So, that was cool. And our other house that was about two streets away fallen off the map, but it was good to see Lulworth, the tower block there. And then opposite that, there's another model that's slightly bigger. Do you know what what scale the other one was? 1 to 500. That's a bit more colourful. And I think they put buildings on there that are proposed just to see how they would look or to show people the architectural impact they would have. And even I'm getting bored even talking about this, but I I I liked it. It was good to see a wee London. More importantly, their toilets were absolutely beautiful. And it's really difficult to find toilets that aren't in three points. Starbucks or McDonald's. What was the What was three points for? Three points were the toilet and then the one point was the model. Was the model? Oh, good. So, the the model scored a point. A four out of 10 from this teenager. So, the next place we're going to is is a bit weird. I've seen it on loads of YouTube videos. Um, you really want to see this, don't you? Where we're going now. Show it in a video for sure. Okay. So, it's part of the original London Roman Wall, but it's in the basement of a car park. So, we got to find the car park. This is the London Wall car park. Apparently, it's around here somewhere, but I don't know where. I'm a wall. I'm in Roman times where Oh, you can see a bit of a wall over there. Okay. There is a street called London Wall and I think it's here. So, uh the car Oh, this looks good. Ooh, Ch. That looks a bit car parky, doesn't it? What do you reckon? Just walking some random alleyways now. Oh, yeah. There we go. Onto car park. Fantastic. This is Oh, this is like here. So, in Roman times, this would be where they park their chariots. Oh, look at this.

We should Google where in the car park it, shouldn't we? It might even be. It could be. I don't remember being I think it's definitely this car park. We can see the Roman wall just just ahead of us now. There we go. Oh, it's got a door. Don't even go in. Oh, you can. You can go in. No, it's locked. Of course, you can't go in. Look, it's a nice door. So, that's it. We've come all this way. Did you outside my heart? And that's it. I show from all angles. It's actually in car park space number 52 if you're looking for it. Purple 52. Can't park in number 52. There's some more here. We can actually touch it. I'm not sure I want to touch a Roman wall. Yeah, you just did. There we go. We've done it. So that's it from Roman time. Jump. Some van is parked next to the Roman wall. Space number 54. So instead of knocking it down, they uh gave it a parking space. Could they build like over it? Do you think they designed the whole parking lot around this wall? Yeah, probably. They'd have to. Well, the street is called London Wall. It shows how much London has risen over the years. That was cuz that's Yeah, that was ground level before. Where's the exit? Uh so in Roman times, this is where they go to the toilet. Oh, it does smell like Roman buildings, doesn't it? Old churches. This doesn't look like an exit. This is backrooms. Oh, that's a nice That's more like So, this is the nice way to get to it. We went completely the wrong exit. It's still got arrows from CO times. They still those arrows are still on the floor, aren't they? I want to make a video about that co signage that's still up 5 years later. But this this is the proper entrance with toilet sign where no toilets working. There you go. Wow. I mean, you wouldn't guess this. There's no There's no sign there, is there? There's toilet. There's a toilet sign. But this is So, this is the entrance. There's like no sign that it's even a car park, let alone uh bit of Roman wall down there. So, a score out of 10. A teenage score out of 10 for that. Seven. Solid seven. That was cool. So, that's better than the model. Yeah. You like the wall? Okay. Would you like to see a bit more wall? I found it. Oh, we're going to go to um Oxford Street now. And to do that, we're going to go over there. There's an Elizabeth line stop, so it's going to be really fast.

Yeah.

[Music]

It's July, by the way, but it's our only super bad day of weather, which is great cuz it's nice, little bit stormy, little bit of rain, not too much. Uh, but it makes it much easier to be pounding the pavements. Uh, I think we're going to go over this way now to my teenager's favorite chain store over here. I think this is one of the original CEXs, one of the original computer exchanges in in London and the nation. Uh, we love this little one. For some reason, it has just stayed here, which we love. We love just gorping at the secondhand electronics and games and uh, DVDs. We always we always stop at as many CEXs as possible. I've got a funny feeling we might be seeing one or two more today. Uh but this is the one in Well, I was going to say Soho. It's kind of Nohoo, north of Soho. So, how how much out of 10 would you give that one? CEX. Yeah. Feels good. Five. Five. Yeah. We're getting a bit of a league table here, aren't we? So 5 for the CEX.

Shut it down. Yeah, they they've sold it to who? Uh hotel. What? So people stay? Yeah. We're now in Tottenham Court Road going to the other uh CEX which is just down here. [Music]

[Music] old electronics. [Music] So, what what score out of 10 for this branch of CEX? Seven. Seven. So, this is better than the other one. Okay. Yeah. Let's eat, I'm hungry. Okay. Now we're going to get a bus, a number 73 bus down here down Tottenham Court Road. Turn right onto Oxford Street for a new place that's opened very recently. Very excited about this one.

[Music] So where are we going now? IKEA. and it's 1:30, so this is going to be absolutely the busiest time of day as well. So, we came here only a few months ago before it was built and it was just a pop-up shop and it was like a bit of a PR stunt where they just had a few things and now it's opened properly.

[Music] Yes, the cafe is down here underground one floor down and I don't know what the deal is for ordering. I think we're already in the wrong place.

What do you want? Yeah. Please leave the building immediately.

Just about to order. I'm not buying. And there's a there's a message saying, "Please leave the building immediately." I was just about I was just about We just ordered. Uh-oh. I was just about to go. This is emergency, right? So we're at the last time we can go. And now look, just before we head, we need to find an emergency exit. Seriously. Okay. Yeah, you can go. Just get out. [Music] Technically, we can just go. We could just run through. [Music] Seriously, don't run. Just get out.

Just get out. like

I wanted those meatballs. Oh, thank you. Well done for not tapping the car. That was close.

[Music] We did. Let's just go.

So, that was eventful. Okay, so we're now evacuated from the IKEA store. I think they just burnt some meatballs or something, didn't they? All the um the canteen stuff. I got a feeling that they might have been responsible for that. Maybe someone the alarm or something. Yeah, it could be someone pushing the alarm. You don't know though. You can't you got to be safe. Do you know what? Yeah, it's true. That's the first time I've been in a store evacuation. Wasn't it interesting? I stood there for 30 seconds before. Yeah, I You'd have gone quicker, wouldn't you? I think I would have just gone and we were the only ones to use that emergency exit as well. People just Yeah. Yeah. Like waiting to go up the escalator. I know. That was our lunch again. Right. So the second time this is actually the second time we tried to get meatballs in Oxford Street. But what is good though is they might wipe all those orders off and then we could go back in again when they've declared it safe. When are they going to say that? I don't know. Do you think it's safe being here? Should we like get out of the way? Oh man. Just as I was about to like tap it, it went Ooooh! Did you think that you tripped off the alarm with the 24 meatballs we ordered. We were here like literally 10 minutes before 4:00 on a Sunday and they said, "No, you we're not doing it. You You got to go." We're like, "Oh." We were this close to the meatballs and now we're just about to tap the credit card. That IKEA's cursed So, should we should we give it a provisional score? What score would we give the IKEA store Oxford Street? If I got it, that would have been a nine, right? It would have been a nine, but there's minus one. Minus one. Making us use the emergency exit. I liked that we had a bit of jeopardy, a bit of excitement, bit of emergency meatballs. I'm going to... Yeah, I wanted my meatballs. I'd give it three for the evacuation experience. Yeah, I've never had to do that. Yeah, that was cool. I need you. I hope I didn't. So, next we're going here. John Lewis everywhere. He's going for it. I didn't. So, next we're going here. John Lewis. Uh hopefully there won't be a fire alarm. It definitely won't be meatballs though, unfortunately. But we like we like hanging out here on the top floor. I can show you. Uh we're going to go just up there onto the balcony up there. [Music] So, we have come to the top floor here at John Lewis where they have a restaurant. But the best thing about this restaurant is apart from they do all sorts like coffees and uh uh fish and chips. We've gone for chunky chips. And you get to take it out here onto the balcony which it was just £2.50. You can sit outside. There's a little door at the back and uh you can overlook Oxford Street. It's fantastic and get infinite. I love it here. I always come here just to kind of clear my head, have a little coffee. They're rebuilding Devon's next door, so you can probably hear the construction work bang banging. They've been doing that for years. It's true. But it is a really nice experience just sitting outdoors just get fresh fresh air. But I was going to say a bit of calm, but you can't hear it over the construction noise. We've gone for chunky chips because we want to save ourselves for the the meatballs. It's a day out with dad. Double chips. These chips are absolutely gorgeous.

Absolutely perfect. served almost instantly. Is it really hot?

Amazing. Maybe you can see that.

What What would you give John Lewis? Uh food was great. 10 10 chips. First 10 minutes and we didn't get kicked out. Yeah. that cost them. So, we're back on the street of Oxford and Oh, look. It's a undercover car there. What?

There's something going on. Usual bit of BMW parking. It's like stealth stealth police car. Act like a BMW driver. Uh so, we are now going to go back to Field of Dreams. Hopefully uh fire alarm free IKEA now. See if we can get those meatballs. I swear if something else happens. Third time lucky. Here we go. They're all coming out. What's going on?

Okay. Thank you. Why do you want chips? Yeah, chips, please. But don't tell anyone that we're filming. meatballs. You want to scan your IKEA card? Oh, yeah. Why not? Yeah. Those were the emergency doors that we ran through. That was good, wasn't it? So, that's that's the way to do it.

So, we finally finally got our meatballs. They come in a box, which is kind of cool. And um get a little bit of lingenberry on there. Just a tiny very delicate little slight blob of lingberry sauce jam on the meatballs. We're on a what would you call it? A counter with stalls. It's pretty pretty comfortable. How is it? Worth the wait and three visits with no fire alarm. And then I've got the uh sustainable cutlery as well, which is nice. Got some gravy. Oh, perfect fries. Doing meatball as well. He's doing meatball as well. I should be having a gravy this morning. What? At home? No. Here we go. See, I think these are better than the ones at Southampton. No offence. I Southampton. These seem more delicately cooked. What do you think? I love that. That's what you have to worry about cuz you choose chips. Yeah, it's true. Those chips chips are bad. They're bad. I think we're now going to go to London's West London and uh we'll see Westfield down there. One last look at the uh the sights and sounds of Oxford Street, Regent Street. We should go down here. Let's go down the tube.

[Music]

This is a Central Line train to Ealing Broadway.

So, we've taken the Central Line to here. Beautiful Shepherd's Bush. We've got the Westfield Center on the left and we got the Not so Field uh shopping centre on the right. Which one would you prefer to go to first? The Westfield just there. And we've never been to this CEX. CEX in Shepherd's Bush. Score out of 10. Found what I want. So that's five. And then I use my voucher. This is sick. I I give it a five though cuz five. I wait to wait a long time for like a Skyfall DVD of which there were many. I brought a cable. So I give I give that a five as well. A nice cable. It was a nice cable for a good price. We've now come here to Westfield, London, just over the road. This is the Westfield Shopping Centre, White City. Just going to wander around aimlessly, I think, here. And I'm I'm looking for a wallet at the moment. It turns out I'm really fussy cuz I've had my wallet for over 20 years. And uh it seems I really want a very specific shaped appointed wallet. We just had a look around the the BYD cars. That was fun. Well, I give that a a five out of 10 as well. They look good on the outside, but inside quality. Yeah. So, we're in the the John Lewis in Westfield. And every time I've been in here, it's not been busy. That's nice. That's already scores a five. So, we find ourselves in another John Lewis balcony. This one is at the Westfield. I I've never been here. It's crazy. We've been We've been to Westfield so many times. I didn't know this balcony existed. It's really nice. Just get to see see where I used to work over at BBC TV Centre. Just nice views of uh West London. Looks all right in the sunshine. Now we are on our Boris bikes. We're on some Santander cycles. So, we've got a couple of bikes and it's not cheap, but it's cheaper than the line bikes. I think we're going to see if we can cycle over Tower Bridge. And to me, this is terrifying cuz there's no segregated cycle lane on the Tower Bridge. And we've got crazy cyclists as well. Okay, so Tower Bridge, it's just over there. We'll somehow get across six lanes of traffic. That is not on the cycle path.

[Music]

Check it out. You don't want to go through... I do!

look at this.

There we go. That was brilliant. But let's never ever do that again. That is terrifying. People do it every day. So, I'm calling this success. I think you can do this again sometime. Yeah. But thank you for hitting the thumbs up or the subscribe button. It really helps us to keep this channel going right here over your face, Joe. Here's what YouTube knows you'd love to watch next.

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