Last Updated on 17 November 2025 by Colette
This post features a gifted experience & affiliate links
Ever wanted to be a competitor in Race Across the World? Well, now you can have your very own adventure across London as you see the Christmas lights this festive season!
(There are two options for Race Across the World in London – West End London or City of London – we tried the West End version which is Christmas themed!)
Race Across The World: The Experience is a time limited, Christmas special where you get to see the lights and decorations as you solve a series of puzzles, clues and riddles. I took my sister (fellow Christmas aficionado) and Annabel (RATW aficionado) with me to see what it was like.
After signing up, you get sent your initial set of instructions of your start point via WhatsApp. You need to be there ready to start your adventure at your allotted time.
We found the set up process easy and the instructions clear throughout, which we thought was really important as without it the experience wouldn’t be as fun and could feel quite stressful (that doesn’t mean the clues are easy though I’m afraid!)
At each checkpoint (there’s four) the clock stops and you can get food and drink, there’s even a 20% discount. The final 3 stops are all pubs, which is worth bearing in mind if you have children with you (was fine for our group of all adults though).
We loved racing through London (we are all so competitive) seeing the sights and solving the clues, with some good natured bickering along the way! After being in the lead at the first two checkpoints we were absolutely gutted to finish second!! But that just shows you need to think carefully about what you do, as a flat out dash to the end might not lead to the fastest overall time.
Here’s some tips from us to help you make the most of your Race Against the World experience:
- Decide what’s important to you before you start. There’s different options e.g: (1) be the fastest; (2) see the most sights (3) bit of a mix. Whichever one you choose to do you’ll enjoy, but you can’t do them all and if you’ve not agreed an approach it’ll lead to disagreements!
- Give people roles! There’s lots to keep an eye on: time keeper, navigator, quiz master etc. This keeps everyone involved (and also doesn’t make it too much for the lead person).
- Use your rest stops. There are points where the clock stops, take advantage of this and catch your breath, take a comfort break and stop for food and drink.
- Don’t rush reading the clues and instructions – if you rush you might make a mistake and waste valuable time. Similarly, take your time when you get to where you think the clue is, as it might not be immediately obvious.
- Remember that it’s not the real life competition….If you find yourself shouting at people to run to the next location you’re probably taking it a little bit too seriously!
- Have enough battery on your phone or make sure more than one person’s phone is registered so the instructions go to a couple of you! I’d be gutted if my phone had died half way through as we would have been stuck!
- The adventure takes longer than you think (about 3 hours all in all) – so decide what time is best for you and if you should eat beforehand. I think if I did this again I’d start earlier or eat beforehand (we started at 18:30 and finished at 21:30 so I was absolutely starving at the end of it).
We really enjoyed Race Across The World: The Experience – Christmas Special, and our friendships just about survived, too! If you think it might be right up your street, you can find more info here: https://raceacrosstheworldexperience.com/london-west-end/. You can also take part in a City of London or Manchester Race Across the World Experience!
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