What to do this weekend, from grindhouse cinema to summer solstice

10 minutes 

Stockwell Bus Garage, London 

Yes, it is just a bus garage. But it’s also more than that; there’s something about this place late at night, after the buses have gone to sleep. A friend showed me Stockwell Bus Garage after a night out in Little Portugal and I’ve been going back intermittently ever since. The enormous, curved, concrete roof shelters about 200 double-deckers, all huddled together in big, red rows. I’m not sure you’re technically supposed to be there, but it’s probably fine as long as you don’t loiter.  

Two hours

Mystery movie at the Nickel 

London’s new “grindhouse” cinema is not for pearl clutchers. Just a few weeks ago they showed Lady Terminator (1988), a film in which an anthropologist is possessed by an ancient sex demon via a snake that enters her vagina. A film called Fucktoys is showing twice this month along with George A Romero’s The Crazies and a straight-to-television movie about the dangers of cocaine. If life is like a box of chocolates, then the Nickel is like a box of spiked chocolates, some of which might make you ill. Nevertheless, people love it. The Nickel only opened last year and it already has regulars. There’s also a great bar downstairs. On Saturdays they show a mystery movie. Do not bring the children. 

Evening

Scotland v Morocco at the Three Sisters

Keen readers will be aware of our deputy sports editor Jessica Hayden’s recent trip to the Scottish capital to witness the start of the country’s first World Cup campaign since 1990. You could feel the hangover radiating off the video team deep into the following week. At 11pm on Friday, Scotland play Morocco, on paper a much tougher opponent than Haiti, who they played in their opening match, and a win of this magnitude would blow the roof off the Edinburgh pubs. Even mired in controversy, as it is this year, the tournament still has the power to lift a city into the air. It only comes every four years and, for the Scottish, decades might elapse before it returns. You should go and enjoy it with them. Drink responsibly. 

Morning 

Summer solstice at Avebury 

You’ll have to get up very early or pull an all-nighter, but the lack of sleep is worth it for the annual, cosmic giddiness of the solstice celebrations. There are lots of places to experience this, most of which are in the West Country: Glastonbury Tor, Stonehenge etc. Best of all, though, is the standing stones at Avebury, which are estimated to be 800 years older than Stonehenge. Avebury solstice is a bit more laid back than its more famous counterpart 38km to the south. History pedants will point out that the stones were more likely to have been built for the winter solstice, which was a more important mark on the calendar for ancient Britons, but nobody wants to wait around in the cold and pissing rain these days. Come 21 June, people descend on Avebury. There are witches, hippies and children who play between picnic blankets. People dance and chant, and when the sun finally emerges, around 5am, breaking over the Ridgeway, everybody cheers.