66(6)! The Coventry Street Vampire It is a case obscure, hardly spoken of. Whilst the legend of the Highgate 'vampire' continues to intrigue and be discussed, something just as wicked occurred several decades before, in the West End at Coventry Street. In 1922 a giant bat-like creature had been seen in the vicinity of West Drayton Church, as I have mentioned before, and some believed it was the vampyric spirit of a creature once......

Booze might now be banned on public transport, but that doesn't stop us getting trolleyed in the stations. The Betjeman Arms recently opened at St Pancras, bringing a much-needed touch of class to London's catalogue of terminus taprooms. To celebrate, we decided to go on a campaign for rail ale. Despite objections from our livers and serious renal remonstrance, we spent last Saturday working our way though a laevorotatory pub crawl of the major......

And that's 'Back' in more ways than one. Long-time readers may remember our (n)ever-popular journeys through the capital's snickleways and ginnels. Each week, we'd explore a fresh, and sometimes not so fresh, shortcut through the busy thoroughfares of London. Well, thanks to some words of encouragement in our recent readers' survey, the alleyways have returned. So pinch your nose, check that your wallet's secure, and follow us into Londonist's back passage. 37. Charing Cross highwalk......

It's late and you're somewhere near Leicester Square. You want to sit down and rest those dance-weary feet - or like Londonist, you are a glutton and you're looking for some dessert. Head to Café Ciao with its range of gelati displayed and giant plastic ice cream outside. Their dessert menu is full of concoctions like these pictured but if sweet treats aren't your thing, there's a menu of savouries though we haven't visited......

Though Boris Johnson's campaign team may have trouble waking up in the morning, the man himself is not lying down when it comes to outflanking Ken on public transport. His latest initiative is for a network of express buses in south London. The nattily named "London Orb" would offer an alternative to overcrowded rail services, running express bus services between key locations and interchanges that are tough to traverse by train. BoJo apparently dreamt......

Even on its quietest weeks, London is something of a happy haven for bibliophiles such as ourselves, though we may be doing nothing more than perusing one of the city’s many lovely bookshops. This week, however, we’re in a veritable book geek heaven, as the London literary scene goes all glittery, playing host to some major names and fantastic events, leaving us tongue-tied and weak at the knees. Do we gush? Very well then,......

Every now and again we try and bring you the finer things in life. Sure, there's loads of indie, goth, electro and Viking death metal to talk about but what about music on the more classical end of the spectrum? Portico Quartet are currently touring their "inimitable" sound with Basquiat Strings and will headline a gig at the Union Chapel this Friday. We'll be there but we're not sure what to expect. They have......

Tube travellers from Balham to Barnet are unhappy at claims the Northern Lane will be separated. According to leaflets being pressed into commuter flesh at Hendon station, TfL, like some latter-day Moses, has "recently announced plans" to part the oft-delayed line, creating two distinct services - one running south from High Barnet via Bank, the other from Edgeware via Charing Cross, with nary a switchover between the two. Trouble is, the story's cobblers. While......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 7th January 1927: The first commercial transatlantic telephone service is launched, connecting London and New York. Tuesday – 8th January 1991: A packed rush hour train carrying over one thousand commuters collides with the buffers at Cannon Street station, killing one person and injuring hundreds more. Wednesday – 9th January 1806: Following a grand state funeral, the body of Lord Nelson is buried beneath the dome of......

2007 is quickly slipping away, and with it the few remaining book events for the year. As most of us are busy buying books for the bibliophiles on our shopping lists rather than reading or going to signings this week, we thought we’d present you with an alternative Book Grocer today. For those of you already finished with your shopping (you overachievers you), the traditional listings follow. If, like Londonist, you go for the......

Last full week before Christmas, we expect your bank account's feeling the strain. All that Christmas shopping and partying taking its toll? If you want to make the most of being out and about before Christmas cabin fever and complete exhaustion set in then we're here to help. Monday: Keep the braincells going through silly season. Go to the free lecture at Gresham College about why our society rewards celebrities, fads and fashions and......

This week’s events are top-heavy with poetry readings. Have our novelist friends squirreled themselves away to write tomes in their Christmas cards, we wonder? Monday: Head to the RADA Foyer Bar for a reading from the Poetry School’s third anthology, I am twenty people! All inferences to the contrary, there will actually be six, not twenty, new poets reading from their work. Free, 7.00pm. Tuesday: We were reminded last week that poetry isn’t just......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 3rd December ????: Nothing of any interest has ever happened in London on this date. Sorry. Tuesday – 4th December 1882: The Royal Courts of Justice on The Strand are opened by Queen Victoria. Wednesday – 5th December 1905: Part of the roof of Charing Cross station collapses, killing six people. Thursday – 6th December 1983: Britian’s first heart and lung transplant operation takes place at Harefield......

It’s not all about St. Pancras, you know. (Although, to be honest, it is mostly.) Some First Great Western services into Paddington are a bit shit, MP implies. Overrated immature French plonk now available on the Gatwick Express from Victoria. Yippee. Major vexations for some East Sussex commuters travelling into and out of Cannon Street and Charing Cross. Naff re-branding for trains out of Liverpool Street. Spluttering indignation over mothballed ex-Eurostar platforms at Waterloo.......

Londonist asks that most pressing of daily concerns: where to go on your lunch break. Wahaca 66 Chandos Place WC2N 4HG Nearest Tube: Charing Cross, Covent Garden, Leicester Square 0207 240 1883 12pm-3:30pm, 5:30-11pm (Monday-Saturday) 12pm-3:30pm, 5:30-10:30pm (Sunday) Map Expect to Pay: Most dishes cost around £3.50, platos fuertos (bigger dishes) around £8 Rating: 8 out of 10 “Tender, marinated pork served with smoky black beans, green rice and pink pickled onions.” That’s pork......

London Street Art 2 is the sequel to, well, erm, London Street Art. The pocket sized book chronicles some of the more interesting graffiti from the past year. We asked photographer Alex MacNaughton about his latest collection of images - many, like the shot above, show street art that has since vanished. Warning: Some readers may find his comments about Flickr disturbing. There's no 'about the author' on the book, so tell us a......

As if Open House wasn’t enough to get you exploring the capital tomorrow, TfL announce London Walking Weekend. They’ve arranged free walks in every borough and have a big tent at the Mayor’s Thames Festival to offer further advice. As usual with such things, they’ve conducted a questionnaire to make the job of the headline writer a little easier. We’re told that 1 in 6 Londoners think Embankment and Charing Cross stations are a......

One of Londonist’s fave websites is seat61.com. Now this is not because we are closet anoraks, or are forever secretly planning our escape from the capital – it is just a damn fine website. Everything that you ever wanted to know about trains but were afraid to ask. Not just London, but worldwide. Journey to plan? We bet your travelling conundrums are already addressed on the man in seat 61’s site. It is a mammoth......

When Westminster City Council took on the free newspapers London Lite and The London Paper, Londonist was fully supportive. Tired of the masses of papers scattered around the city at the end of each day, the Council asked that Associated Newspapers (owners of London Lite) and Rupert Murdoch's News International (owners of The London Paper) take responsibility for the amount of rubbish they were creating and install 150 newspaper recycling bins around Westminster and......

It’s not really news that hailing a cab in the middle of the night is getting harder. We can remember the days when you could step out of a bar at midnight or tumble out of a club rather later and still expect to find a magical proliferation of roomy, comfy Hackney Carriages to spirit you home. Alright, you might dent your overdraft but at least you didn’t have to hunt down a smelly,......

Westminster City Council is making a stand against free London newspapers London Lite (owned by Associated Newspapers) and The London Paper (owned by Rupert Murdoch) not because the City Council is tired of the two types of non-news offered in the many, many copies distributed each day, nor are they taking an official stand against the irritating assault course of newspaper distributors outside each major tube and bus station but because there is just......

Londonist was much struck by the documentary Taking Liberties and got in touch with director Chris Atkins to find out more. Is it really just motivated by a personal hatred of New Labour? Why do they want to ASBO John Reid? And what's this about rolling full-tilt into a group of rozzers while stuffed inside a bin?! Read on to find out more ... What prompted you to make Taking Liberties? I woke up......

If you played video games in the 90s, chances are that you also read Digitiser, Channel 4's Teletext games magazine. It was renowned not only for its incisive, honest gaming news, but also for the surreal humour of lead writer Mr. Biffo, which was responsible for breaking the brains of teenagers all over the land. Snakes in hoodies would "cuss each other bad" alongside the letters page, Insincere Dave analysed the day's news, and......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 18th June 1972: A British European Airways plane bound for Brussels crashes moments after taking off from Heathrow airport, killing all 118 passengers. An inquiry later concludes that the pilot had made a ‘speed error’ and stalled the plane, causing it to crash into a field in Staines. Tuesday – 19th June 1997: McDonald’s wins a libel case against two members of the ‘London Greenpeace’ campaigning group.......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 11th June 1988: The Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute (a.k.a. Mandela Day Concert) takes place at Wembley Stadium. On a scale approaching the Live Aid concert that took place some three years earlier, more than 600 million people worldwide tune in to watch the epic day-long concert featuring dozens of high profile bands protesting against the apartheid regime in South Africa and the ongoing incarceration of Nelson......

A trackside fire in Bermondsey this morning has led to the closure of London Bridge station with Southeastern, Southern and First Capital Connect services to London Bridge, Cannon Street, Charing Cross and Waterloo East affected. The station will remain closed until at least 7pm this evening although London Bridge tube is still open. Additionally road closures are in place at Blue Anchor Lane, Rockgrove Way, Southwark Park Road, Lucey Way, St James' Road, Jamaica Road.......

If you could release a spoken word album of cabbie stories you would have to advertise it in a K-Tel Hit Parade LP style. It would sound something like this: New from K-Tel, it’s the 100 best Cabbie stories coming to all good record stores! Who could forget such classics as; “You’ll never guess who I had in the back of my cab the other day…” Or the mercurial: “The trouble with Blair is......

Fresh this Week: Penned in the Margins presents a diverse line-up tonight, featuring poet and and former snooker pro Jane Holland, Stuart Taylor, Amy Prior and Joe Dunthorne. Free at 7pm, The Whitechapel Gallery, 80-82 Whitechapel Road, E17QX. Givin’ ‘em away: To celebrate the shortlist for the 26th Mind Book of the Year Award, which celebrates writing that contributes to public understanding of mental health issues, judge Michele Roberts will attend a preview featuring......

Fresh Next Week John Lanchester's third novel Family Romance is the story of an extraordinary family - from his grandparents’ beginnings in rural Ireland and colonial Rhodesia, through his father’s wartime separation from his parents and his mother’s tragic first love, her decision to become a nun and her adoption of a new identity. Next Wednesday, 7pm, £6, The London Review Bookshop, 14 Bury Place, WC1A 2JL, 020 7269 9030. Givin’ ‘em away: Tomorrow......

Just out the Van: Alan Lee, best known as co-lead artist on Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movie trilogy, but also the conceptual designer on the films Legend, Erik the Viking and King Kong and the television miniseries Merlin will be signing The Children Of Húrin tonight. Get your geek on at 6pm, Forbidden Planet Megastore, 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, WC2H 8JR. In Next Week: The Society of Young Publishers presents a reading by......