A Night of Fun at Whistle Punks: Urban Axe Throwing, London

I’ve been in training for some time to prepare for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. First, I completed the couch-to-5k programme through Zombies, Run! so that I’d be in a position to run from zombies and be useful to my post-apocalyptic community. Next, I needed to learn to fight and so I headed off to Whistle Punks: Urban Axe Throwing in London to learn the art of axe throwing.

I'm going to need to admit it sooner or later so I might as well do it here: axe-throwing is not as easy as it looks. We’ve all seen those TV shows where one friend surprises another with an evening of axe-throwing and they both spend the night actually hitting the targets and doing pretty well.

That doesn’t happen in real life.

Axe-throwing is an art but luckily there are experts around to help you.

Whether you’re a natural axe-wielding champion or a lesser-able beginner, it’s a lot of fun. Each group of up-to-ten players is paired with an instructor who is really helpful. Our very patient instructor was able to identify when we weren’t relaxed enough in our throws (because you should totally be relaxed when you’re wielding an axe, right?), when we were too near or too close to the target, or when we weren’t holding the axe correctly. It helped too – I scored 4 points in the second round!

The biggest excitement came when the two finalists were announced – a chap called James and my husband Stephen. The winner would need a bull-eye to win and it would need to be definitive.

Up until this point, we’d pretty much been cheering uniformly for each other but I couldn’t help but give an extra cheer when Stephen threw a near bulls-eye. It was very exciting but James turned around and gave me a very betrayed look!

With revenge clearly in his mind, James turned around and threw a perfect, dead-centre bulls-eye. The cheers were huge and immediate: a well-deserved win and a fabulous time had by all!

I’d absolutely recommend Whistle Punks if you’re looking for a fun way to blow off steam and better your axe-throwing score.

Food and Drinks

We used to joke about ‘London prices’ – a time about 4 years ago when cocktails began to hit £10-£12. Then it went beyond a joke and you’ll easily be paying £15-£18 for cocktails. I mention this because we were most pleasantly surprised by the food and drink prices at Whistle Punks. Pizzas are £9 (and they are delicious), cocktails £8 and the Happy Endings ice cream sandwiches are £5. There is also space to eat and leave your drinks without the worry of an axe disturbing them.

The Small Print

• Over 18s only.
• Whistle Punks is proud to be a Living Wage employer.
• For every ticket sold, Whistle Punks plants a tree through ecologi.com.
• The Whistle Punks experience caters for friends, couples and groups looking to celebrate any occasion in style with craft drinks and delicious pizza.
• The 70-minute sessions are run by a dedicated expert instructor who offers an axe-throwing masterclass before practice rounds then an adrenaline-packed head-to-head tournament before an overall axe champion is crowned. Individual tickets start at £22 (off peak) per person for 70-minutes throwing axes with an instructor.
• Exclusive lanes can be booked from £220 (off peak) for a maximum of 10 players per lane.

Address

Whistle Punks Urban Axe Throwing (London Oxford Circus)
53 Eastcastle St
London
W1W 8DN

Note: we were guests at the Whistle Punks opening party on this occasion but as always, my promise to my readers is that I will give an honest review of my experiences, warts and all, whether I’ve paid for the experiences or not.