A trip to London and how to save money while traveling
Great Britain has long attracted us with its great history, stunning architecture, ancient castles, an abundance of museums and theaters, and other diversity of cultural life.
And so the date of the trip was chosen and serious preparations began. We, as people who know how to save money, decided to immediately refuse to buy a ready-made tour package. We know from our own experience that it is often cheaper to book flights and hotels on your own. But, after studying the reviews on the Internet and visiting the official website upon obtaining a visa, we decided to contact the agency for help. They did not want to take risks - the desire to visit the capital of Britain was too strong. And the procedure for obtaining a visa was too complicated for us.
Air tickets. Tickets were booked in advance, 3.5 months before the date of the trip - it turns out much cheaper.
We flew with Scandinavian Airlines, one of the cheapest airlines. Round-trip tickets for two adults cost us almost 22 thousand rubles. The only drawback of these airlines is that there are no direct flights to London, and you had to land in Oslo. And the rest is all right.
Hotel. The hotel was also booked in advance via the Internet and independently. The undoubted advantage of early booking is cost savings. If you cancel a reservation a month before the desired date, then no commission is charged. The main condition for choosing a hotel for us was its location. Chose - Royal National 3*. The price for a double room per day was 85 pounds. This hotel is considered one of the cheapest of its category in this part of London. And the location is actually very convenient (Metro Russell square) all the main attractions are within walking distance.
Otherwise, the hotel justifies its 3 * and we did not expect anything else. The hotel is large - 7 floors, noisy, but the rooms are clean and have everything you need. Breakfasts are modest, but we often went to neighboring cafes and for 3-4 pounds you can have a great breakfast.
With a visa, everything worked out for us - hurray! And we began to plan our acquaintance with London!
After researching the sights of London on the Internet, we have compiled a list of "must" places to visit. On the first day, we decided to book an individual tour of the center of London. The price pleased us, it also worked out per person if we joined the tour group. But the tour was individual, with a Russian-speaking guide, and only for the two of us. They never liked to go around in a crowd as part of a group, often you don’t hear anything and you have to wait for the others until everyone gathers and is ready to listen.
Wherever we go, we always book a sightseeing tour with a personal guide on the first day - this helps to quickly adapt to a new country, navigate the city and quickly understand important points such as transport, food, shops, currency exchange, etc. You can always ask questions that have arisen along the way, because it is impossible to foresee and study everything in advance. We enjoyed the tour very much, it was interesting and informative. And most importantly, our guide Elena helped us sketch out a convenient plan for further acquaintance with London (we still had 8 full days left).
Where have you been:
After a sightseeing tour of the city center, where we saw the main sights of London, we headed to Hyde Park. The weather was wonderful and we spent the rest of the day there. The parks in London are amazing! We have visited several and each of them is charming in its own way.
Well-groomed, clean, large, diverse, with gardens, palm trees and magnificent flowering flower beds even in March, and most importantly free. Almost every one has a pond in which ducks, geese, swans and other birds live and you can feed them from your hand. If you are lucky with the weather, be sure to visit at least a few central parks - you will not regret it! In the evening we had dinner in a pub near our hotel and tasted the famous Guinness beer. London is famous for its beer establishments. The pubs here are loved and frequented. During the day, whole families come with their children, eat, drink a glass of beer. And in the evenings noisy companies gather in them, have fun and dance. The English pub is a local attraction. It has a completely different, some kind of inexplicable atmosphere than in ordinary restaurants and cafes.
Museums. Museums in London are amazing!
The main museums worth visiting are the British Museum, the History Museum, the Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. You can also go to the National Art Gallery in Trafalgar Square and the Tate Modern Gallery, but this is more for those who are interested in painting, although if you have time, you can go in, I assure you, no one will be left without impressions. It is especially pleasant that they are all free, like most other museums. There were only a couple of rainy days on our trip, and we enjoyed spending these days in museums.
Soho, Chinatown and Covent Garden. Everything is next to each other. Soho is London's most ethnically colorful area. Many restaurants, bars and cafes with cuisine of different nationalities - French, Thai, Italian, etc. Many shops and souvenir shops. The Chinese Chinatown is also located here, where we tasted a wonderful Peking duck.
Be sure to take a walk to Covent Garden. There is the Royal Opera House, an interesting market and shops. Every day, free performances by artists take place on the territory of the market, we got to a concert of violinists and a circus show. Of course, if you liked the performance and have a desire to thank the artists, then you can put a coin in the "hat" they offered, but not necessarily
Of course, it is worth taking a ride on the pleasure boat -Klippers on the Thames. From the pier in the center (Westminster) depart every 20-30 minutes and follow to the Greenwich area. You can land there and get to know this wonderful area of London. There are such attractions as: Greenwich Park, there is a wonderful garden and deer graze, and there is also a zero meridian and an observatory, as well as the Maritime Museum and Greenwich Market - the famous London market. London markets are a different story.
You can talk about them for a long time, but it is better to visit them yourself. These are not just markets where you can buy anything, from farm products and handicrafts to expensive antiques, there is some kind of special atmosphere and mood.
Near London there are small towns where you should definitely go - these are Windsor and Hamton Court. Excursions are not worth taking - it turns out more expensive, but you can get there on your own and, moreover, very simply. Excellent comfortable trains go from Waterloo station. Everywhere there are audio guides in Russian, cat. already included in the price of the entrance ticket (15-20 pounds).
Windsor. This is the city where the castle-fortress of the same name is located - the summer residence of the queen. It is worth planning a whole day for a visit. You need to purchase a travel card for that day (of course, if you don’t have one) for all 6 zones, so you save on travel.
The train departs from Waterloo station and travels just over an hour. You will also enjoy the outdoor areas!
Hampton Court. Palace, former residence of Henry Vlll. Great place with parks, labyrinth and garden. A train leaves from Waterloo station every 30 minutes. On the way 45 minutes. It is also worth using treval krad.
Transport. When we planned to travel a lot, we bought ourselves a travel card for the day - a “travel card”. The pass can be purchased for a day or a week, only for buses or all modes of transport, as well as select zones. All London is divided into zones from 1 (center) to 6. You can buy a "travel card" at any metro station at the box office and on your own in special machines.
Enter the desired stations or place names in the search boxes and you will be offered several options for transportation and indicate the travel time - very convenient. On it you can see the cost of tickets and travel cards.
And this is a link to the train movement website, where you can see the schedule for Windsor and Hampton Court.
Almost every evening we went to a musical, theater, etc. , and, saving on tickets, sometimes reached 50%. There are official theater box offices in London where tickets are sold at half price. Discounted tickets can be purchased on the day of the performance or up to one week before the expected date, with tickets for the best seats.
I hope my review is useful to someone!
If you have any questions, write, I will try to answer and help!
