Local information

Eating and drinking near Queen Mary

There are several options for eating or having a drink near Queen Mary. The cheapest option is the pub The Half Moon on Mile End Road situated between Queen Mary and Stepney Green Station. Nearby is the more expensive but good quality Italian restaurant Verdi (237 Mile End Road). Near Mile End Tube Station there is the reasonably priced Persian restaurant Ariana (2 Midlothian Road, London E3 4SE) and The Morgan Arms (gastro pub, 43 Morgan St Bow, London E3 5AA)

Accommodation

We know of the following hotels that are reachable on foot in ~20 mins: Travelodge Bethnal Green (£), Ibis Budget London Whitechapel (£), the Whitechapel Hotel (££), Holiday Inn Commercial Road (££), Town Hall Hotel (£££).

Moreover there is a plethora of hotels easily reachable by tube from Queen Mary, especially in the Stratford Olympic park area (one stop from Mile End on the Central line -- note this is London Stratford, not Stratford-upon-Avon!).

Finally, you may want to consider more affordable options like Airbnb (use usual caution when booking).

Public transport

Transport in London can be very expensive so it is important to plan in advance and be aware of the cheapest options. For example a single tube ticket form Westminster to Mile End tube station is £4.80 whereas if bought with a contactless card or an oyster card is £2.30, also contactless card and oyster card offer further reductions on multiple journey by automatically converting from single journeys to travel cards price. Check Transport for London website for details.

The best way to travel on the public transport system in London is by using a "contactless" credit card. However, if your card has been issued outside the UK, it might not be accepted by the machines here.

The second best option is to purchase an Oyster card. This is a pay-as-you-go card which you can buy at tube stations or online (this service delivers the card to your home country). You can still buy single paper tickets but: (a) they are way more expensive, and (b) you cannot use them on buses.

The cheapest travel option (and the healthiest) is to cycle to/from Queen Mary using the Boris bikes scheme (now called Santander cycles). There are several docking stations around Queen Mary. The scheme costs £2 per 24 hours and you can make an unlimited number of journeys each lasting less than 30 minutes. Check the website for all details. There are thousands of available bikes all over London, however if your hotel is east of Queen Mary check on the map if there are docking stations nearby (zoom out and move around to find docking stations, indicated by a blue dot, in the area).

Also cab sharing can be an option. Apart from the classic British black cabs (reasonable to use when 4 or 5 share the fare) there is an increasing presence of the cheaper Uber cabs.