SNAPSHOT: The English countryside, just outside Bath in Somerset.

SNAPSHOT: Piccadilly Circus at night, complete with a double decker bus.

Portobello Road Markets and Notting Hill

Where do you find a tourist in London on a Saturday? Well, it’s such a big place that there obviously isn’t one answer, but one area where you can find lots and lots of them (particularly Australians and Americans, the accents are everywhere) is the famous Portobello Road markets in Notting Hill. And there are a few reasons why. The markets sell everything from amazing antiques to your run of the mill tourist junk, and they also happened to feature in a very famous film featuring Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant. What film? Well, Notting Hill of course!

Two of my friends and I decided to jump on the tourist bandwagon and try and find some of the sights from the movie one sunny (and yes, it was actually sunny, I’m not being ironic like I usually am when describing London weather… it was still cold though) Saturday. After navigating through the droves of people at the markets (and it is busy… really busy… keep your handbags close ladies) we managed to find what we thought was the bookshop from the film. So we excitedly went inside, only to find on the wall a pin board with articles about how most of the movie sites from the film have either vanished from Notting Hill, or how they were never really in Notting Hill in the first place. It turns out the bookshop was only the inspiration for the bookshop in the film, which of course was a set constructed inside another shop. We also went searching for that notorious blue door, but became quite bamboozled when every second door on the street was blue. The garden where Hugh Grant climbs over the fence with his “oopsy daisy” is inaccessible to tourists because it is a private garden. Oh well. Lucky the markets are amazing… and they did feature in the movie!

The end near to Notting Hill Gate tube station has some lovely antiques shops and stalls selling a huge range of things, from Cigarette collector cards to old cameras, teapots, vintage handbags and other collectables. As you move along the markets, you pass different sections. There is an area selling fruit and vegetables, one for clothing, and down the bottom end it is basically anything goes. Food and drink is abundant. There are market stalls as well as many eateries, cafes and pubs. Be warned though, prices in Notting Hill are not cheap. It’s quite an up-market and funky neighborhood, with many boutique shops, and hence you pay a bit extra for a little of Notting Hill’s “coolness” when you buy a sandwich or fair-trade coffee in this part of London.

The markets are open all day on Saturday, and the closest tube stations are Notting Hill Gate (circle line) and Westbourne Park (Hammersmith and city line).