Best Ways to Spend Your Downtime on a London Business Trip

A business trip to London sounds great on paper… but not so much when the whole trip is just hotel, taxi, meeting, another meeting, back to the hotel, and repeat. A bit of a waste when you're in one of the most interesting cities in the world, isn't it?

The problem, of course, is time. You might only have 90 minutes between meetings, a free afternoon after finishing early or an evening to yourself before flying home the next morning. You don't want an enormous sightseeing itinerary, but what you do want is something good that actually fits the gap you have.

So, here are some better ways to spend your downtime on a London business trip.

Got an Hour? Head Up to Sky Garden

If your meetings are in the City, Sky Garden (1 Sky Garden Walk, EC3M 8AF) is one of the easiest ways to see some of London without losing half your afternoon doing it.

Public access is free, with weekday visitor slots running from 10 am until 6 pm. Once upstairs, you've got views across the Thames towards The Shard, Tower Bridge and much of central London, alongside the indoor gardens on levels 35 and 36.

You do need a timed ticket, so this isn't somewhere we'd rely on spontaneously when a meeting finishes 45 minutes early. If you already know there's a decent gap in your schedule, book ahead.

The location is particularly useful for anyone working around Bank, Monument, Fenchurch Street or Liverpool Street. You can be upstairs enjoying the view and back at your next meeting without turning a spare hour into an expedition across London.

Got Two Hours? See London From the Thames

If you've got a couple of hours between meetings, one of the easiest ways to see a decent chunk of London is from the river.

Uber Boat by Thames Clippers runs throughout the day, with stops at Westminster, Embankment, Blackfriars, London Bridge, Tower Pier and Canary Wharf. That makes it particularly useful if you're already working around Westminster or the City.

A simple option is to board at Westminster Pier, Victoria Embankment, and travel east towards Tower Pier. Along the way, you'll pass the London Eye, South Bank, St Paul's, Tate Modern and The Shard before arriving beside the Tower of London and Tower Bridge. And if your meetings are in Canary Wharf, the boat from Canary Wharf Pier reaches Tower Pier in around seven minutes!

Fares start at £11.70 for a Central Zone single bought online or through the app, with return fares from £23.40. Services run seven days a week, so this is something you can fit around the diary without needing to book a formal tour.

Use a Free Afternoon to Switch Off

Sometimes the best thing to do after three days of meetings isn't more sightseeing.

Biome at Corinthia London (SW1A 2BD) sells weekday spa passes for £175 per person, giving you access to the vitality pool, amphitheatre sauna, steam room, cold plunge, heated loungers and sleep pods. The spa itself opens from 7 am until 9 pm, while treatments run from 10 am to 8 pm.

As a business traveller, you can finish your final meeting and spend a few hours there without committing to an entire spa-day package. Equally, an early riser could fit in some time before the working day starts.

It's also close to Whitehall, Embankment, Trafalgar Square and the West End, so this makes plenty of sense for someone working around Westminster!

Take Client Drinks Somewhere Decent

If downtime still involves entertaining somebody from work, we have a great recommendation for you.

Scarfes Bar at Rosewood London (WC1V 7EN) opens from 4 pm until late and has live music from 8 pm Monday to Saturday. The room is filled with velvet armchairs, antique books, a fireplace and original work by caricaturist Gerald Scarfe, so it feels much more like a private drawing room than another hotel lobby bar.

Scarfes also serves light food, so if the conversation runs longer than planned, you don't necessarily need to move somewhere else for dinner.

When the Meeting Overruns... Eat Anyway

Business dinners have an annoying habit of becoming business emails when the final meeting finishes too late. If you're staying around the City, Duck & Waffle at 110 Bishopsgate (EC2N 4AY) solves that problem rather well because it's still operating 24 hours a day.

The restaurant sits on the 40th floor, with a dedicated late-night menu running from midnight until 5.30 am. Current dishes include its signature Duck & Waffle, duck barbacoa tacos, foie gras crème brûlée and truffle grilled cheese.

For anyone staying around Liverpool Street, Bank or Bishopsgate, it's an easy way to rescue the evening without heading across London in search of somewhere still serving proper food.

When You're Travelling Alone

Business trips can be oddly antisocial once the working day finishes. Maybe your colleagues have gone home... perhaps the client dinner was cancelled... or everybody else on the trip has their own plans.

You could use that time for a solo dinner or head to one of the bars above. Some travellers, though, would simply rather have company.

A businessman staying in London for a couple of nights, for example, might browse London Deluxe before the trip and arrange a companion to join him for dinner, drinks or an evening out. If he only has one free evening, that can make far more sense than spending half of it in a hotel bar hoping to meet somebody.

Don't Let Work Take the Whole Trip

The easiest thing on a business trip is to let every spare hour disappear. A meeting finishes early, so you answer emails. Dinner gets cancelled, so you order room service and open the laptop again. Before you know it, you've spent three days in London and barely experienced the city.

So, if you already know you've got an evening or a couple of hours free, protect that time before the diary fills it. Just choose something you'd look forward to doing once the meetings are finished. After all, if work has brought you to London anyway, you may as well get something out of being here.

Partner supplied feature