I explored London's hidden island that's only open twice a year – it felt like a Californian escape
Eel Pie Island, located in Twickenham, has an illustrious history.
8
Eel Pie Island, located in Twickenham, has an illustrious history
Credit: Booking.com
8
In the 19th century, it became a popular resort with steamboats and the Eel Pie Island Hotel
Credit: Cyann Fielding
8
Today, the island still boasts marks of its past, while the people who live there include a number of artists
Credit: Alamy
While many know the destination for hosting a number of
Originally, the tranquil spot was thought to be a monastic site before later transforming into a popular
Then, in the 19th century, it became a popular resort with steamboats and the Eel Pie Island Hotel.
When the hotel later closed in 1967, the island became a hippie commune and evolved as a creative community.
Read more on travel inspo
Today, the island still boasts marks of its past, while the people who live there include a number of artists.
It's one of London's best-kept secrets as it is only open to the public twice a year.
And this past weekend I wandered over the footbridge that separates the island from the mainland, to explore the jungle on the island.
Full of giant palm leaves looming overhead, the island doesn't take too long to explore and can be done in just an hour.
Most read in News Travel
And standing at the entrance way to the island, I felt like I was exploring Little Venice in Los Angeles.
To get to the artists' workshops, I followed a meandering path taking me past wood-panelled homes - many decorated with enamel signs, American-style mailboxes and odd treasures.
'I tried out the Race Across the World Experience in London'
The names of places also fitted the
Reaching the end of the path is an operational boatyard like felt something out of a movie.
On the other side of the slipway is where you'll find the workshops of the island's 26 artists, selling a range of art, sculptures and ceramics.
The workshops are all found nestled in the thick greenery and are surrounded by random abandoned items like water fountains and traffic cones.
Whilst essentially a junk yard, the eclectic items mixed with the jungle felt more like a set from Pirates of the Caribbean.
8
Full of giant palm leaves looming overhead, the island doesn't take too long to explore and can be done in just an hour
Credit: Instagram/@secretlondon
8
There are many wood-panelled homes on the island - many decorated with enamel signs, American-style mailboxes and odd treasures
Credit: Alamy
8
The island is home to 26 artists, selling a range of art, sculptures and ceramics
Credit: Cyann Fielding
It is worth noting, however, that all the workshops are rather snug and may require some shuffling around other people to see all the items available for purchase.
On the plus side, though, some of the workshops sell handmade tipples too, like Pimms, for just a fiver.
You can explore the island and workshops for as long as you like on the day you have a ticket for, but everything can be visited in just an hour if you wish.
Tickets to visit the island are also free.
It takes less than 25 minutes to reach Twickenham via train from
After exploring the island, you can venture back to Twickenham high street, which boasts a number of independent shops and vibrant
There is also a
Plus, the
8
To me, it felt like wondering around Little Venice in Los Angeles (pictured)
Credit: Alamy
8
It takes less than 25 minutes to reach Twickenham via train from London Waterloo, and then Eel Pie Island is roughly a 10-minute walk from the station
Credit: Alamy
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Examiner
8 hours ago
- Irish Examiner
Clodagh Finn: It's not the Hunger Games, it's not Miss America — it's our weird, beloved Rose of Tralee
I can already feel the dread rise up in me as the clock ticks down to another Rose of Tralee festival. How, in this millennium, can we still have a Lovely Girls contest, to use one of the kinder terms adopted by the sneery naysayers? Sometimes I wonder that myself, but then the Tralee native in me takes over. Rose of Tralee? Bring it on, she says, along with the buzz, the spotlight (so rare for Kerry's county town) and the crowds, sadly also rare even at the height of the tourist season. It is hard to envisage now but, in the festival's heyday, the town filled with so many people that you had to elbow your way through the streets. It was Mardi Gras, Kerry-style. Or that is how it felt to grow up in a place which, for one week in late August, pulsed with people, music, food and glorious spectacle. The street festival — varied and boisterous — and the Rose competition in the big tent — controlled and curated — seemed worlds apart, but one kept a curious eye on the other. On selection night, news of the crowned Rose filtered down on to the heaving streets before fireworks burst into the autumn sky. The festival was held later then and it delayed our return to school by a week — another reason to love it — but one year we were back in time to welcome the winning Rose. There was a surge as we rushed out of the science lab, without a hint of irony, to greet (or maybe scrutinise, we were teenage girls after all) this young woman who was only a few years older than ourselves. She was down-to-earth and smiling. She wore a sash with the words 'Rose of Tralee' emblazoned on it — there was no sashay — yet it felt like the kiss of celebrity. And success. And it had all played out on television in our local town. It was reality TV before we had a name for it. You could say the organisers of the Rose of Tralee festival were early adopters of a trend that would develop with such force later Miss America was first televised in 1954, attracting a staggering 27m viewers. A little more than a decade later, in 1967, a small festival in a small town in Ireland followed suit. What is staggering is that it is still doing so, and that it is such a hit with viewers. Here are the stats, courtesy of RTÉ: 'Across the two days of the festival, an average audience of 412,900 tuned in on RTÉ One. The show also had a 1-minute reach of over 1.3m across both nights.' By way of contrast, last year the Miss America Pageant was streamed 1.2m times on YouTube. RTÉ presenters Dáithí Ó Sé and Kathryn Thomas will host the Rose of Tralee competition. Picture: Andres Poveda I'm not equating one with the other, just making the point that the Rose of Tralee Festival has shown an uncanny knack of tapping into the endless appetite for televised competition. Far from being outdated — 60% of last year's viewers were between 15 and 34 — it appears to be scarily on trend. It's not Squid Game: the Challenge — there isn't enough prize-money for one thing — and it's certainly not the Hunger Games, but the enduring popularity of the Rose of Tralee Festival, the TV show, seems linked to the collective drive to turn everything into a contest. There was a time when a game show and a cookery show were entirely distinct, but the edges started to blur and then the 'win, win, win' theme of the game show seeped into everything else — gardening, baking, painting, pottery-throwing, design, dancing. Pick a human activity and you will find a TV show pitting practitioner against practitioner on a channel somewhere. Why does everything have to be a competition these days? In some ways, the hobby or activity contests are at the benign end of the scale. They judge what a person can do rather than the person themselves. Having said that, The Apprentice, which purports to evaluate the business skills of its participants, is a study in ritual humiliation. I have heard it well-described as a 'theatre of cruelty'. And it has given the world Donald Trump, a man who has turned world politics into a kind of dystopian reality TV show. Next to all of that, the Rose of Tralee is a breath of fresh air. It's certainly a competition, but you can't really describe it as a beauty contest. The organisers have wisely put the emphasis on connecting the global Irish diaspora. This week co-host Dáithí Ó Sé framed it like this: 'It's such a celebration of Irishness and Irish women, and really pinpoints what women are doing at this particular time. In the 1970s, you would have had teachers and nurses, and today you're talking about engineers, doctors and mechanics. That is what I love about it.' He has a point. This year's Laois Rose, Katelyn Cummins, is a dairy farmer and an apprentice electrician. She has already used her selection to encourage other young women to consider a trade as a career option Also, to the critics and the detractors, here's what she said when she was chosen to represent Laois: 'The whole experience has been amazing. I've met so many lovely girls. I've made friends for life for definite. And now I can't wait to make even more memories and friends in Tralee.' Post-festival, many of the Roses tell interviewers that they have had the time of their lives. And, as far as we know, they were willing and happy participants. Since 2021, the festival has been open to married women, trans women and it upped the age limit to the ripe old age of 29 to be more 'inclusive'. It also recruited a female co-host Kathryn Thomas. Why then, does it still rankle? And it does. In March 2022, for example, the audience in a packed Vicar Street in Dublin laughed riotously when comedians Deborah Frances-White and Kemah Bob took out their carving knives to tear the Rose of Tralee to sorry shreds? By a surreal twist of fate, they did that routine just before turning to me. I found myself in their elevated — and very funny company — because I had been invited with the then Lord Mayor of Dublin Alison Gilliland to talk about Her Keys to the City, a joyous project that celebrated 80 of the capital's overlooked women. But just before I began to talk about the strong, independent, forgotten women who shaped Dublin, I had to own up, rather sheepishly, to being from Tralee. The place collapsed with laughter. And then, as now, I did my usual uneasy August dance, drawing inspiration from Deborah Frances-White, aka The Guilty Feminist, herself. As she says, her show and podcast provide a forum to discuss our noble goals as 21st-century feminists but, also, the hypocrisies and insecurities that undermine them. She gives this example: 'I'm a feminist but … one time I went on a women's rights march, and I popped into a department store to use the loo, and I got distracted trying out face cream. And when I came out the march was gone.' And here's what I say every time the Rose of Tralee Festival comes around: 'I'm a feminist but … I won't be saying zip about the procession of dresses, the party pieces and the patronising patter. They all say they enjoy it. And Tralee needs them. Can you please, just this once, let us have this overdue, if imperfect, fleeting moment in the sun.'
The Irish Sun
11 hours ago
- The Irish Sun
I ditched New York City for upstate and found hundreds of vineyards, NASCAR racing experiences & world famous waterfalls
STANDING on Hurricane Deck with water whipping around me and Niagara Falls thundering behind, I'm experiencing a different side of New York. Most visitors cram into Manhattan, but New York City takes up just 0.56 per cent of the entire state. 6 With water whipping around me and Niagara Falls thundering behind, I'm experiencing a different side of New York Credit: New York State Department of Economic Development (NYSDED) 6 Watkins Glen is a charming village that also hides a legendary race track where Formula 1 once raced - and I took a thrilling ride in the pace car Credit: Alice Penwill 6 Buffalo is the gateway to Niagara Falls, just a short drive away Credit: Getty Beyond the concrete jungle of America's most populated city lie vineyards, breweries, lakes, a whole lot of classic US charm and, of course, those famous falls. Upstate New York, despite its high-end reputation, is also much kinder on your wallet. The cost of two days in the city is equivalent to about six days outside when it comes to accommodation, dining and activities. My journey began in Syracuse, in the heart of the Finger Lakes region — a lush green area known for its scenic beauty and more than 1,600 vineyards. READ MORE TRAVEL GUIDES Without much persuasion, I stopped at a few to sample the local produce — I had a tipple at Anyela's vineyard and the Beak & Skiff brewery, which had very tasty ciders. A half-hour drive away is Skaneateles (pronounced skinny atlas), one of the region's most exclusive spots. Lake Skaneateles is said to be the cleanest in the world, but what really stands out is the shorefront, which is full of sprawling manors with sweeping lawns, guest houses and boat garages. It's a popular place for celebs, with former President Most read in News Travel Just south of Syracuse lies Watkins Glen, which looks like a Hallmark movie set until you hear the roar of engines. The charming village is home to the Watkins Glen International track, where Formula 1 raced for 20 consecutive years from 1961 to 1980 before Nascar took over. Martin Lewis warns about strict passport rule that could see you board your flight - only to get sent home on arrival I had a ride in the back of a pace car for a speedy lap (in motorsport, a pace car leads the racers in warm-up laps). And I saw a bright yellow American school bus — full of grinning students — tear around, too. Turns out that anyone can give it a try. You can even take your own car, or bus, for a spin. Rochester, a mid-sized city on the southern shore of These days, it's better known for the Strong National Museum of Play, a huge, hands-on museum dedicated to toys, games and childhood. Here, I attempted (and failed) to beat other players at From there, I headed west to my final, and favourite, stop: Buffalo. Sitting where the Buffalo River meets Lake Erie, it proved that the state's 61 cities beyond NYC are also well worth exploring. Screams of delight I followed the riverfront past guided missile cruiser USS Little Rock, through Veterans Memorial Park, and on past the restored 1920s carousel at Canalside, where families queued for a ride. The standout spot, though, was RiverWorks — a creative reinvention of old grain silos, now home to ziplines, climbing walls, a big wheel, kayaking and lively bars. Buffalo is also the gateway to I arrived at night to see the illuminations, a spectacle in itself. 6 Naval history fans will love taking a look at the guided missile cruiser USS Little Rock Credit: Getty 6 Strong National Museum of Play, a huge, hands-on museum dedicated to toys, games and childhood Credit: New York State Department of Economic Development (NYSDED) 6 The Sun's Alice Penwill gets a close-up view of the Niagara Fall Credit: Alice Penwill But at that point I didn't quite grasp the full power of the famous waterfalls. The next day, I saw them in all their glory. Looking like a blue penguin in my oversized anorak, I boarded the Maid Of The Mist tourist boat to get closer to the thundering cascade. At first, the boat bobs along at a glacial pace. Then, after a light spray of water, the full force of the falls hits. Picture screams of delight, anoraks flapping and thousands of gallons of water crashing into the river below. If you want to feel it properly, head to the top deck. Prefer to stay dry? Stick to the lower level. The boat tour is a must — and so is the Cave Of The Winds. This attraction is a series of wooden walkways leading right to the base of Niagara's Bridal Veil Falls and up to the Hurricane Deck, where the water spray slams sideways and where standing still is a feat in itself. I managed to hold my pose just long enough for a photo, before stumbling away, soaked and buzzing with adrenaline. The Big Apple is a bucket-list must, of course, but don't forget to take a bite out of the rest of New York State, too. GO: NEW YORK STATE STAYING/GETTING THERE: An 11-night fly-drive tour of New York State costs from £2,770pp based on two sharing, including car hire, Top Of The Rock Observation Deck in NYC, Niagara Falls Tour and return flights departing Heathrow on April 27 2026. See OUT & ABOUT: For Watkins Glen International see The Strong National Museum of Play costs $25 (£18.45). See Maid of the Mist tickets are $30.25 (£22.33) and the Cave of the Winds costs $23 (£17.12) at MORE INFO: For New York State see
The Irish Sun
15 hours ago
- The Irish Sun
Gary Busey, 81, pleads guilty to groping woman at New Jersey horror movie convention
OSCAR-nominated actor Gary Busey has pleaded guilty to a sex crime after allegedly groping a woman at a horror movie convention in New Jersey. The Lethal Weapon star, 81, admitted during a Zoom court hearing on Thursday that the incident was 'not an accidental touching'. Advertisement 2 Gary Busey pleads guilty to sex charge Credit: Court TV 2 Busey is known for starring in Lethal Weapon Credit: Alamy Busey was accused of inappropriately grabbing two women's buttocks and attempting to unhook another woman's bra during a photo shoot at the Monster-Mania convention at the Doubletree Hotel in Cherry Hill on August 13, 2022. One victim claimed Busey placed his face near her chest and allegedly asked 'where she got them' before reaching for her bra strap. Busey initially denying any wrongdoing — even telling paparazzi in Malibu that 'none of that happened' and the women 'made up a story'. But the actor has now pleaded guilty to one count of fourth-degree criminal sexual contact. Advertisement Under a plea deal, three other counts of criminal sexual contact and one count of attempted criminal sexual contact were dropped. More to follow... For the latest news on this story, keep checking back at The U.S. Sun, your go-to destination for the best celebrity news, sports news, real-life stories, jaw-dropping pictures, and must-see videos . Like us on Facebook at Advertisement Most read in The US Sun
