Best of London... Open Top Bus Tours

There is no question that the Open-Top Bus tours which have sprung up in major cities just scream "tourist." But, if you've never been someplace and you are there to see the city, then why wouldn't you take advantage of something designed to point out all the major spots while having an experienced guide point out interesting and often amusing details. On your first trip, I highly recommend this! There is more than one tour, but here is the URL for the website of the one I've been on. http://www.theoriginaltour.com/

I didn't take advantage of this until my third trip to London and that was a mistake on my part. Having lived in NYC and Boston and being very comfortable with subway lines, I readily and without hesitation took the London's "Tube" service. Their subway map is famous (http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/travel/downloads/tube_map.html ). It's color-coded and many stops are named for the popular site nearby and so I went from one end to the other everyday, whizzing from the Tower of London to Harrod's. From St. Paul's to Paddington. Except "whizzing" is not quite the right adjective. Because London is a large city and it can take a few minutes to travel from one station to another, much less to change trains a few times. Also, what appears to be two stops quite a ways apart, on different lines and stops apart, may in fact be a few short blocks from each other above ground. I wasted a LOT of time going back and forth on the Tube, traveling relatively long distances and thinking that because the Tube map made them look close, that they were or just the opposite. I would have been much smarter to get a sense of the city from above ground. Additionally, there are several major "sites" in London that are primarily just to be "seen."

I think there are several benefits. First of all, you can get the lay of the land, check a few things off your list, and travel for the entire 24 hour period that your ticket is valid (with the exception of the night hours they are inactive) at no additional cost. Not all buses have live guides so try to get one that has a live guide. Depending on bus and route, they may not all have guides. Check the brochure. The guides are able to give advice about good times to visit busy sites, etc. And, if you do it on a day when you may still be jet-lagged, it is nice to be able to get around and yet sit and relax a little. 

On my first Open Top Bus tour, we were stopped in place at one point and we were passed by Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles being driven somewhere. No guarantee that will happen to you, but the sites are still very good!