7 Best Scavenger Hunts & Treasure Trails in London

Move over Benedict, there are new Sherlock’s in town! Here are the best scavenger hunts and treasure trails in London.

Looking for something a little different from escape rooms? Or perhaps a cute date idea?

Scavenger hunts and treasure trails still have that mission of finding clues, but outdoor so it’s a great fun thing to do in London where you don’t need a face mask. So it’s more difficult and there’s a very likely chance of getting lost (especially in London).

And check out my hidden gems in London!

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Here are the best scavenger hunts in London I’ve played

The Hunt for the Cheshire Cat and Moriarty’s Game (HiddenCity)

The themed scavenger hunts in London

I really enjoyed receiving text conversations for the clues, it does feel like Moriarty and the Cheshire Cat are ‘talking’ to you and sending you onto the next clue. It’s also great exercise. Both games involved covering around 3 miles around London for a few hours (unless you don’t realise that every wrong answer you submit incurs a time penalty and start making joke answers which add up and your official time is 11 hours…).

The riddles are super fun and clever and great value for an evenings entertainment at £25 per person. I’ve loved playing two of HiddenCity’s treasure trails so can definitely recommend.

V&A Musuem/Natural History Museum

The scavenger hunt about history

The V&A Museum and Natural History Museum are huge. Where do you start?

Just when you think you’ve seen it all, there’s an amazing staircase or the world’s first museum cafe. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you should play V&A Secret Seekers.

You’ll learn all about the buildings grand and super interesting history and little details you’ve probably never noticed before. Challenges are told through important figures in the V&A’s history (I recommend doing impressions).

Great for adults as well as families and kids. And best of all it’s free. Just visit this url on your mobile.

And if you love learning about animals, Breadcrumbs have a scavenger hunt which will take you all around the Natural History Museum in 2/3 hours for £10

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The Murder of Hector Reeves – Hyde Park

The scavenger hunt in Hyde Park

Get ready to do your worst Scottish accent:

‘There’s been a murder’.

Can you solve the mystery in an hour?

We didn’t. Skip a question and you incur a 10 minute penalty. Some of the questions are real thinkers too!

Great for sunny weather and a (brisk) walk around Hyde Park, it’s £25 per person.

Agent November

The scavenger hunt with the thrills

Reasons you’ll want to play Agent November. You get to make up an agent name. You get a walkie-talkie. Your whole group gets to wear a pork pie hat.

Teamwork is key as the questions are pretty difficult, but it can also get super silly at times (wearing pork pie hats help).

We went on a team building day out and can definitely recommend it if you’re looking for a fun work thing. Our scavenger hunt was based around the British Library area. Prices vary depending on the number of players, but an 8 player mission is £200.

Again we failed (I’m seeing a theme here, maybe I’m a subconscious mole…). Agent November is £120 for up to 8 detectives.

Geocaching

The free scavenger hunt

I was introduced to geocaching by my brother who’s mad about it. It’s a worldwide community. We went to Hannover and Hamburg just for Geocaching…

It’s pretty fun and has taken me to places in London I’ve never been to. You have to try and be incognito when finding clues (people who don’t geocache are called muggles).

This can be pretty difficult in more public places in London, like Neal’s Yard… But going in stealth mode makes it all the more fun too!

There are a ton of geocaches in London, so you’re bound to find some near you. Some are super creative. You can download the app or access the geocache clues online.

Here are the top 20 caches in London to get you started.

P.S you might be interested in these related articles about London…
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Treasure Trails

The scavenger hunt wherever you are

While I haven’t tried Treasure Trails in London, I have used them in Dunoon and Bude.

The scavenger hunts I’ve done take form in a murder investigation and you have to find cross off a list of suspects and murder weapons, but there are different themes like spy missions too.

They’re reasonably priced at £9.99 and have a variety of difficulty levels, terrains and trail lengths. There are an incredible 60 scavenger hunts in and around London.

You can print them off and even personalise them too!

Let’sRoam

The scavenger hunt with fun photo challenges

I haven’t used the Let’sRoam app in London, but I used it in Iceland. It led us around the city and all of the main attractions whilst providing historical stories.

A unique feature of this scavenger hunt which I really enjoyed are the photo challenges. They encourage you to be creative which can be very silly! I think it’s a great way to remember a trip or city.

Let’sRoam offers several packs, including dates, bachelor/bachelorette and birthday which can shape the challenges. They even offer stay at home scavenger hunts and pub crawls!