4 Best Sights in Hampstead, London

For generations, Londoners have headed to Hampstead Heath to escape the dirt and noise of the city, and this unique 791-acre expanse of rus in urbe ("country in the city") is home to a variety of wildlife and habitat: grassy meadows, woodland, scrub, wetlands, and some of Europe's most venerable oaks. Be aware that, aside from the Parliament Hill area to the south and Golders Hill Park in the northwest, it is more like countryside than a park, with signs and amenities in short supply. Pick up a map at Kenwood House or at the "Enquiries" window of the Staff Yard near the tennis courts off Highgate Road, where you can also find details about the history of the Heath and its flora and fauna. An excellent café near the Edwardian bandstand serves Italian food.

Coming onto the Heath from the Savernake Road entrance on the southern side, walk past the children's playground and paddling pool and head uphill to the top of Parliament Hill. At 321 feet above sea level, it's one of the highest points in London, providing a stunning panorama over the city. On clear days you can see all the way to the Surrey Hills beyond the city's southern limits. Keep heading north from Parliament Hill to find the more rural parts of the Heath.

If you keep heading east from the playground instead, turn right past the Athletics Track and you'll come to the Lido, an Olympic-size, outdoor, unheated swimming pool that gets packed on rare hot summer days. More swimming options are available at the Hampstead ponds, which have been refreshing Londoners for generations. You'll find the "Mens" and "Ladies" ponds to the northeast of Parliament Hill, with a “Mixed” pond closer to South End Green. A £2 donation is requested. Golders Hill Park, on the Heath Extension to the northwest, offers a good café, tennis courts, a duck pond, a croquet lawn, and a walled flower garden, plus a Butterfly House (May–September) and a small zoo with native species including muntjac deer, rare red squirrels, and a Scottish wildcat.

Highgate is not the oldest cemetery in London, but it is probably the best known, both for its roster of famous "inhabitants" and the quality of its funerary architecture. After it was consecrated in 1839, Victorians came from miles around to appreciate the ornate headstones, the impressive tombs, and the view. At its summit is the Circle of Lebanon, a ring of vaults built around an ancient cypress tree, a legacy of the 17th-century gardens that formerly occupied the site. Leading from the circle is the Egyptian Avenue, a subterranean stone tunnel lined with catacombs, itself approached by a dramatic colonnade that screens the main cemetery from the road. Such was its popularity that 19 acres on the other side of the road were acquired in 1850, and this additional East Cemetery is the final resting place of numerous notables including Karl Marx (the site's most visited) as well as George Eliot and, a more recent internment, George Michael. Both sides are impressive, with a grand (locked) iron gate leading to a sweeping courtyard built for the approach of horses and carriages.

By the 1970s the cemetery had become unkempt and neglected until a group of volunteers, the Friends of Highgate Cemetery, undertook the huge upkeep. Tours are conducted by the Friends, who will show you the most interesting graves among the numerous statues and memorials once hidden by overgrowth. The tours of the West and East sides are 75 minutes each. Alternatively, you can go on a self-guided ramble, but admission to the catacombs is by guided tour only. There is a reduced price for East side only admission. You're expected to dress respectfully, so skip the shorts and the baseball cap; children under eight are not admitted and neither are dogs, tripods, or video cameras.

It was while lodging in this house between 1818 and 1820 that the leading Romantic poet John Keats (1795–1821) fell in love with girl-next-door Fanny Brawne and wrote some of his best-loved poems. (Soon after, ill health forced him to move to Rome, where he died the following year.) After a major refurbishment to make the rooms more in keeping with their original Regency decor, the house, now a museum devoted to the poet's life and work, displays all sorts of Keats-related material, including portraits, letters, many of the poet's original manuscripts and books, the engagement ring he gave to Fanny, and items of her clothing. A pretty garden contains the plum tree under which Keats reputedly composed Ode to a Nightingale. There are frequent Keats-themed events, including evening poetry readings, concerts, and special talks featuring local literary luminaries (an adjoining building houses a community-operated library). Picnics can be taken onto the grounds during the summer; during the spring and summer, the house organizes monthly Keats in Hampstead guided walks (150 minutes, £10).

This largely Palladian villa offers an escape to a gracious country house with a magnificent collection of old master paintings and beautiful grounds, all a short Tube ride from central London. Originally built in 1616, Kenwood was expanded by Robert Adam starting in 1767 and later by George Saunders in 1795. Adam refaced most of the exterior and added the splendid library, which, with its vaulted ceiling and Corinthian columns, is the highlight of the house's interior. A major renovation restored four rooms to reflect Adam's intentions as closely as possible, incorporating the furniture he designed specifically for the space and his original color schemes.

Kenwood is also home to the Iveagh Bequest, a world-class collection of some 60 paintings that includes masterworks like Rembrandt's Self-Portrait with Two Circles and Vermeer's The Guitar Player, along with major works by Reynolds, van Dyck, Hals, Gainsborough, Turner, and more. Knowledgeable room guides are present to answer any questions on the rooms and the works inside. The 112 acres of grounds, designed by Humphry Repton and bordered by the less manicured Heath, are equally elegant and serene, with lawns sloping down to a little lake crossed by a trompe-l'oeil bridge. All in all, it's the perfect retreat for an 18th-century gentleman. In summer, the grounds host a series of family-oriented events, including an Easter Egg hunt. The Brew House café, occupying part of the old coach house, has outdoor tables in the courtyard and a terraced garden.