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kidk

Re: London Axon Fun Part 2!

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 1:26 am

Shad0

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 1:40 am

_________________
These were the puzzles that would take a day, these were puzzles that would take a week, and these puzzles they'd probably never figure out until we broke down and gave them the answers. ... The Cloudmakers solved all of these puzzles on the first day.

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

I live and work in London and have only just found out about this local Axon.
I can get to Soho by 6pm easily so I'm willing to help if it's not too late.

A couple of points:
Shops in England do generally close at 6 but...
London is not like the rest of the country - especially Soho. Pretty much everything would be open.
Someone mentioned a pub near the hotspot. Did you check near the toilets as that's where the payphones usually are?
I work for TfL so I'm going to see if any of our GIS people have time to help.

Please let me know if you need me to do anything.

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 7:17 am

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

Oh and Streetmap accepts the co-ordinates and returns the following:

http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.srf?x=529725&y=180969&z=0&sv=51.512767+-000.131950&st=7&mapp=newmap.srf&searchp=newsearch.srf

and the next link is a photo guide to the shops in that area

http://www.streetsensation.co.uk/soho/so_intro.htm

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 7:25 am

Flidget Jerome · Unfettered Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 308

The address we pulled off the most likely-looking payphones was 'outside 56 Dean Street, London W1', if anyone wants to play around with that. Everything we did seems to confirm that those are right at the coordinates they gave us.

Richchestmat, this is one of those sidestreets that's mostly little clothing shops. At least during the weekend, they were all closed by the time we got there. I'm trying to work up the courage to go back there today and start asking shop keepers if they've been getting any bizarre messages on their answering machines.

I think Fi did ask the bartender at the pub if they had any payphones but I was too far away to hear. Malrog, do you know?

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 7:42 am

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

http://www.streetsensation.co.uk/soho/ds_east.htm shows the east side of dean street which is the odd numbered side. There is no west side shop map.

With our luck it'll be in the Groucho Club. Wink

I was in the area on Friday too - I just wish I had known then rather than having to risk the rain today.

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 7:56 am

Malrog

Yes, I do know. Fi did speak to someone behind the bar and they said there were no payphones in the pub.

kidk: it does seem that the right address will be one on Dean Street, try all the 50's and maybe a few either side. Good luck!

- Malrog wishes all London Axon hunters the best of luck.

PS. I'll be around most of today, so if you need any more info then PM me or post in this thread.

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 8:02 am

_________________

Quote:

Sofia: A payphone?
Kamal: Ancient piece of crappy hardware, half of them wouldn't even take incoming calls, no GPS...

Malrog

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 8:08 am

_________________

Quote:

Sofia: A payphone?
Kamal: Ancient piece of crappy hardware, half of them wouldn't even take incoming calls, no GPS...

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

There's a solicitors and 'media company' called Discreet at 56 Dean St

The most interesting spot would be The French House at 49. It's a pub that used to be the unofficial HQ of the French resistance during WWII

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 8:18 am

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

Oh check this out!
http://www.urban75.org/vista/oldcomptonst1.html
It's right on the hotspot! - full 360 of the view around

EDIT: swing it so that Costa is on the left and it's right in front of you. You can see the red phonebox on the right behind a car. Opposite that, back on the left side of the street is The French House, which would be my hot tip if the payphone really doesn't work.

Malrog

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 8:38 am

_________________

Quote:

Sofia: A payphone?
Kamal: Ancient piece of crappy hardware, half of them wouldn't even take incoming calls, no GPS...

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

So is anyone else going tonight?

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 10:30 am

Flidget Jerome · Unfettered Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 308

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 10:48 am

richchestmat · Boot Joined: 25 Aug 2004 Posts: 50 Location: London

I'm just checking I can get out of something routine tonight. Otherwise I can get to Costa for about half-past to quarter too (I finish work at Victoria at 5pm)
Feel free to pm your mobile number. I'm not 100% yet mind you.
I'll be wearing a green top and light grey jacket and beige trousers.

EDIT: I am coming - see you there!

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 11:15 am

Flidget Jerome · Unfettered Joined: 26 Aug 2004 Posts: 308

No luck in London again.

Got to the site and met up with Richchestmat. We checked with all the business on lower Dean Street, who were all really nice to the crazy people asking them bizarre questions (especially Dennys, who were friendly and helpful and didn't reach for any of all those sharp, shiny knives they were selling). No one's been getting any stray calls.

Tried calling Mowgli88. Called myself Melissa and said I was calling about bees. The guy at the other end said he had no idea what I was talking about. Sorry Mowgli!

As we were standing on the corner scanning for potential sites, a guy walked by and stopped and we all stared at each other nervously for a few moments before he asked 'Do you like bees?'.

And that's how we met Tom.

Richchestmat and Tom went to cover the bank of phones on Cambridge Circle. I went back to stake out the one further West on Shaftesbury Avenue that Richard and Ian hadn't been able to get to yesterday because it had been in use. Unfortunately, there was a guy already in there waiting for his own phonecall. I tried to ask him if he was a Beekeeper but he didn't speak English. With less than a minute left to go I gave up and went to wait in the booth next to it.

. . . . At 18:07BST I hear my non-English-speaking friend in the phone next to me suddenly burst out of the booth. Hrm. . . .

I tried to ask him if anything weird had happened but, alas, I speak even less Chinese than he spoke English. Richchestmat and Tom said they had the same problem with their bank, they could only secure two of them since the other two were in use the entire time.

Anyway, we calculate that if the PMs coordinates are off by a block, we've got a potential 20 phones the axon could be. If they're off by two blocks, we're talking about over a hundred. Richchestmat took pictures of all the phones we've covered so far so that we can keep track of what we've checked even if no one in the team's been to previous hunts.

Could we have blessing to start a regional coordination thread or should we keep things here?

Also, I heard that emailing Dana with detailed accounts of site problems has helped before. Is that true?

**Posted:** Mon Sep 20, 2004 3:04 pm