Hello,
I will be traveling to London soon and may people who have visited in the past tell me that one of their favorite activities they did was a Sherlock Holmes tour. However I have not been able to find any information on one. Some had said it was part of the London pass and 2-4-1 but it looks like that is no longer the case. Does anyone have any information on a day or night tour.
Thanks in advance
People may have been talking about the very popular London Walks. I've put the URL for the Friday walks below and you can see that one of the Friday walks for this week is Sherlock Holmes.
The Sherlock Holmes Museum on Baker Street is great for Holmes fans. The Sherlock Holmes Pub near Charing Cross has a replica of the famous Baker Street study. I think it was at the pub that I bought a booklet outlining a SH walking route through places featured in the stories, but I found it somewhat disappointing. Try the London Walks walk if you can, and certainly visit the museum on Baker Street.
I will be vacationing in London next week and am interested in visiting Sherlock related sites. Here is a clip from the London Walk's Sherlock tour:
"Ending in a place "where a dream becomes reality." Yes, that's right the superb re-creation of Sherlock Holmes' study. Housed in the building immortalised in The Hound of the Baskervilles and featuring many artefacts donated by the Conan Doyle family, And not only is it the genuine article – as opposed to a tourist trap – it's free to visit."
Is the ending place of the tour the Sherlock Holmes Pub, and is the "tourist trap" the Sherlock Holmes Museum at 221 Baker Street? If the latter is correctly identified is it still worthwhile to visit? Or is it merely a variation of the study plus gift shop?
If I have time I will seek out the building where the exterior shots of "221B" are filmed for the BBC/PBS "Sherlock" series. Are there any major sites that I have missed?
Geor & OP - the website sherlockology has a breakdown of the shooting locations for the Cumberbatch/Freeman Sherlock. The exterior of their 221B is a couple of blocks west of Euston tube/train station (and around the corner from a very yummy Indian place).
We took this tour with Brit Movie Tours and found it quite fun.
Sherlock Holmes and Harry Potter - just make-believe sites of things that never existed
I am fairly sure that Sir Christopher Wren was a real person, who really did design St Paul's Cathedral, and that John Donne was a real person, who really was the Dean there, once upon a time.
Similarly, many real monarchs have really had their coronations at Westminster Abbey. There are even some real people buried there.
So I would say those two buildings have some real history attached to them, from that viewpoint, which may be of interest to some.
I haven't taken the Sherlock Holmes tour, but I have done a number of tours with London Walks, and all were excellent. Check out their website for information. All of the guides I've had so far have been real people.
Hope you have a good trip.
@ Geor -- I don't know where the "London Walks" walk goes, but I'd say the museum on Baker Street is in no way a "tourist trap." Yes there's a gift shop (this is the 21st century after all), and yes there will probably be others visiting. But the recreation upstairs is very careful and true to the Conan Doyle stories.
The SH Pub down by Charing Cross is a pub with a "recreated" SH study. If one of these places is a "tourist trap" it's probably this one. But it's a pub, for heaven's sake -- with an added attraction that undoubtedly sells some beer and grub. I thought it was charming.
I used to appreciate London Walks more when they told you where they were going instead of tarting up the descriptions with cute expressions. I had planned to go with them when in London last month, but reading the descriptions was so uninformative, an off-putting, that I gave up the idea. They're probably aiming for a younger demographic anyway so they can walk faster. ;-)
Hi Dick:
You provided very useful information, thanks. I will most likely visit both of the Sherlock Holmes sites. I think the London Walks tour ends at the pub since they say the unnamed place is free.
As you know the Pacific Science Center in Seattle currently has a Sherlock Holmes exhibition which includes a recreation of his study based on the Doyle writings. It will be interesting to compare all of the recreated studies. If you go there is an optional mystery which patrons can attempt to solve that compares what the London police say about a crime scene with what Holmes says. It is a tough one to figure out. I was still working on it two and one-half hours into the visit, and had to quit when members of my group wanted lunch. Only one person of the five analyzed all of the clues correctly.
