For those who just want a position on whether it’s worth the money, probably not, and here’s why I say this.
It was coming up to my 61st birthday, which was on a Saturday, and given the year we had had, we wanted to do something nice but keeping an eye on budgets. A weekender to Paris was discussed, which on a budget, might have been achievable at around £600-£800. I’d work near the Shard, and obviously it sticks out in the London skyline, so the decision was to adventure in and do the full Shard treatment on a Saturday.
Although the same building, you need to go to different websites to book into ‘the view’, and then for restaurants.
https://tickets.theviewfromtheshard.com
The view from The Shard, either £22 for general, or £36 for all inclusive, we went for all inclusive, but all is not what it seems. Basically, the only difference is the champagne, I thought we had a tour and booked and as we were going to the restaurant later, I decided to book towards the last slot, around 7 pm to line up.
We arrived in good time, and joined the queue at 10 to 7, the queue moved quite fast, but there is airport style security going into the building. You then get immediately stopped for your ‘photo’ for the photobook. Now, make sure you check these, we didn’t, and when we got the end, it was only then that we saw I looked like gerbil in one of them!
A couple of elevator rides later and we walk out onto the platform, only to be told we didn’t have long before closing time. At this time, I asked about one of the ‘experts’, which took about 10 minutes to organise, in that time we grabbed our drinks, which I suspect we paid significantly over the odds for.
The expert arrived, and the views are stunning, we had a cleanish night so it was a wonderful view of London, but I believe it would be even better during the daytime.
We took our obligatory photos, and used the toilets, where you have another great (and personal) view of London. The staff aren’t always sure what floor they are on, so double check when using the elevators with the staff!
We were ushered out, completely forgot I had a £5 credit for the gist shop, but didn’t see anything absorbing anyway, and that was it, a couple of hours to kill before returning for dinner at Hutong.
Saturday night, London, we headed to The George which has a bit of history to it and definitely worth visiting if you are into you London history. It was heaving, with live music and a great atmosphere, but bar queues were a long wait, so after a Guiness, we went to a real, real, London pub. The Old King’s Head, which I also highly recommend visiting when in the area.
I had booked several weeks earlier for The Skyline Experience, which is £145 per person before you even think about drinks. The only reservations were at the end of the night, 10:15 pm, which was fine as Candy and I can be ‘European’ when we need to be.
Walking in a bit early, the atmosphere is quite something, with the background views of London at night, we felt we were in for something special. The ladies at reception were welcoming enough and enjoyed a joke around my birthday and age. We were sent through to the bar to wait for our table. We were fortunate to get a nice corner window table, and I ordered the bottle of wine, cheapest going is £54, so you should know your wines. This was the start, the wine was room temperature, not a great start, and although the waiter thought he knew the concept of ‘taste’ and ‘corkage’, he didn’t.
Nearly 11 pm, and I get a call on my mobile, from Hutong restaurant, asking if I was still going to make my reservation? What? I pointed out to them they had seated me in the restaurant bar 45 minutes ago and were going to come and get me when the table was ready.
So, we were seated, on a reasonable scenic ‘window’ view table, but I noticed an empty table in the corner, being very late for the last booking I asked if we could be on that table, they said they would try and organise something. In the transition from bar to table, our already warm bottle of wine lost its bottle cooler, and was just sitting on the table, warming up further.
After 10 minutes, they seated some other people at the corner table. With some frustration I went over the Maître D’ , expressed my disappointment on missing out on the requested table, without any explanation, and that our warm wine was getting warmer. After 5 minutes the Maître D’ came and collected our wine, and a waitress explained the menu to us.
10 minutes later the Maître D’ returned saying he was replacing our wine with a colder bottle, but one glance we knew it was the same bottle, with a clumsy attempt to reduce the temperature, at least we seem to have bottle cooler again.
Now we are starting to get hungry, and then one of the chefs decided to carve up some duck right behind us, I believe out table was next to serving/waste station. After a further 10 minutes I checked again, and the food finally started to arrive, closer to midnight. The people who had nabbed the corner table were long gone by this time, rubbing some salt into our evening.
The food is very good, tasty, and coupled with the view, does make for an excellent experience, which we were able to enjoy and have some enjoyable time together.
Towards the end, one of the remaining waitresses did bring out a little chocolate treat with a candle to sing happy birthday in her best English attempt, which did tickle my humour somewhat, but like most of the evening, it felt more like an afterthought than a dedicated attempt to make my night truly memorable.
Time to pay the bill, take a look, I doubt you would do it for much cheaper. And yes, that is over £50 for the privilege of being forgotten on check-in, served up warm white wine, and feeling pretty much ignored for the evening!
We had a little look around the floor as it was mostly empty by this time, and there are some fantastic views and atmosphere.
In conclusion, as I said at the top, not worth the money, as they seem to miss all the little details, what they can improve:
- Ensuring the ‘View’ costs are clear on what you are getting for your money.
- Keep track of your guests, if they are checked in, you should be seating them immediately a table is available.
- Serving cold white wine, especially at £54 a bottle, in a bottle chiller, and keeping it there all the time.
- Don’t try and fob off a replacement when it is the same bottle returning.
- Either allowing a table change or explaining why you didn’t and put some other people there.
- Seating and serving reasonably close to the times booked, not as close to closing time as achievable.
It will be a memorable event for me, but not for the right reasons. I f we did it again, I would only purchase the general sky view and go during the day, and re-purpose the other £450 on something more worthwhile.
One Response
it saddens me you did not get a good experience for your birthday, and charging a 15% service charge on top of an expensive meal, but not getting the option of refusing to pay for lack of good service would annoy me, and I would indeed say something about this to the person in charge.
I would happily pay if I felt the service was up to scratch.
thankyou for sharing your experience…xxx