Mission Impossible with a View Review

St Giles London announced the return of the world’s first bed, breakfast and abseil package on Sunday, 28th October and OninLondon were lucky enough to be one of the 3 groups participating in this charity event.  For the daredevils out there, this was the daring feat of abseiling down the façade of the St Giles hotel in Tottenham Court Road in an effort to raise money for the St Giles’ Hotels with Heart Foundation and their partner Centrepoint – an important leading youth homelessness charity, committed to giving young people a future.

Everyone looked excited to get underway in the first group as we all got our safety briefing and harnessed up for the adventurous journey to the roof. Once up the ladder that took us to the roof of St Giles London hotel, the views were incredible. Being in the heart of the historic end you could see famous landmarks such as the British Museum, Piccadilly Circus, London Eye, plus many other major London attractions.

My partners in crime for the event included the hotel’s CEO and Hotels with Heart’s founder, Abigail Tan-Giroud, and none other than London’s own presenter and America’s Next Top Model finalist Annaliese Dayes, who was not at all phased being on the roof of the 50m building. The instructor gave us some more briefing and a practice run on the flat section of the roof for us to get a feel for it. Then it was time for the moment we had all waited for, the abseil.

I went first with Annaliese second behind me. The transition to the point of abseil was probably the hardest part, scaling the ledge on the side of the building to reach the instructor and get all the necessary ropes and buckles to head down the building. Once all that part was done the next hardest part is the movement into position to get the feet and everything in the right place to scale the building. Then the fun begins. With a quick wave to the people on the ground it was time to tackle the beast. I always enjoy this part of the abseil as all the hard bits are over and you can just enjoy the views and just being up there. After waving to a few more people in the windows of the hotel I reached the bottom, it was time to get unbuckled and enjoy a nice cup of tea.

I caught up with Annaliese inside after her abseil and she had a big smile on her face and there were high fives all round. I asked her how it was, and she said: “Great fun, but I lost my legs about halfway down and couldn’t co-ordinate. You made it look easy going first”. Annaliese was not fazed by the heights at all, she just mentioned it was an awkward transition from the roof to get into the scaling position. Finally, I asked if she would do an abseil again and she said: “’I’m not sure. I am the type of person that ticks something off and moves on”. So, my suggestion was a bungie jump next which was laughed at.

Onin London had a fantastic time with a great bunch of people. Everyone tackled the abseil incredibly. Plus, anytime you can have fun and raise awareness for a great cause is a magic day in my books.

Last year in December, staff and guests of the St Giles London hotel raised over £3000 and I would love to know the amount raised this year for the St Giles’ Hotels with Heart Foundation and their partner Centrepoint.

Website: www.StGilesHotels.com

Twitter: @stgileslondon #BeCentral

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stgileslondon/

Instagram: #stgileshotel

Written by Daniel Brodie