Police swoop on late-night storytellers on Hampstead Heath

A hidden enclave of Hampstead Heath became an impromptu stage as dozens gathered for a midnight storytelling session.

Professional storyteller Vanessa Wolf and singer-songwriter Katy Carr took about 35 adults into the depths of the Heath before regaling them with a tale of wartime Poland on Saturday.

The audience were met at Hampstead Heath train station at 11pm before being led to a mystery location, where they were entertained into the early hours.

Ms Wolf, 42, who grew up in Swiss Cottage and went to Camden School for Girls, said: “It was a really exciting evening on a lovely starry night.

“Hampstead Heath at midnight is dark, quiet and magical – a fitting backdrop for our journey into the forests of 1940s wartime Poland.”

She added that the Heath’s constabulary had interrupted just as the tension was building in the story.

“Out of the darkness came these headlights, just as the audience were waiting with baited breath,” she said.

“Of course, we weren’t doing anything wrong, they were just being friendly and checking that everything was alright.”