3 Days in London
 

Just three after a biz trip. Never been. Ideas as to what I MUST see; best location(s) to stay; hotel recommendations; walking day tours would be great.

Definitely spend some time on this board searching for London ideas. Also, get a book like Fodors or Rick Steves London book to get a good feel for what to see and do that sparks your interest. Rick has good walking tours. Get yourself a good London Map (I like Streetwise maps because of their detail) and familiarize yourself with where things are.

I've been twice now, both for long weekends, and enjoy the city immensely.

Stay in a central location -- so you can reduce your travel time to the sights...We stayed in the Victoria Station area, where we could walk to Buckingham Palace & the Westminster area.

Don't miss seeing Big Ben & Parliament, going into Westminster Abbey (across the street from Parliament. Take a flight on the London Eye (visit www.balondoneye.com before hand and even get your reservation in advance).

See the Tower of London (which hold the Crown Jewels), walk through St. Paul's Cathedral, and take the pedestrian Millenium Bridge across the Themes to Shakespeare's Globe Theatre & the Tate Modern next door.

Also, the British Library is a personal favorite of mine. It has a special documents room that has a chilling (in a good way) number of historical documents, from the Stamps which sparked the American Revolution, to copies of the Guttenberg Bibles and the Magna Carta, and the napkin John Lennon wrote the lyrics to Ticket To Ride and other songs.

The National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, along with Lord Nelson's statue and his lions -- is also not to be missed.

Yes, you can do all that in a few days. London is remarkably easy to navigate, and many of the biggest sights are close to each other.

Have a great trip,

Jules

Thank you for the great information. Do you have recommendations for hotels in the areas you recommended?

Did you visit Harrods? Is this a MUST? Some seem to think that it is...

The Open top Bus tours are a great way to orientate yourself. You can buy a ticket that lasts for 24 hours and hop on and off wherever you like along the route.
The Rembrandt Hotel opposite the Victoria and Albert Museum in South Kensington is fine and it's easy to get around from there. Harrod's is just up the road if you feel you have to go there. IMHO it's just an expensive department store.

Another area for reasonable hotels is Bloomsbury near the British Museum- the Bonnington in Southampton Row for example.

Try a London Walk www.londonwalks.com
You don't need to book, just turn up at the tube station that's shown as the meeting point and pay the fee to the walk leader. They usually last a couple of hours and provide fascinating facts and behind the scenes views of the city of London.

Harrods is just a department store, but a big one, and the food halls are worth seeing; they're on the ground floor, so that's easy.
It's impossible to recommend a hotel without knowing your budget. South Kensington is a good area to stay if you've never been to London.

Borough Market: stop by for some great food. Open on Saturday mornings and early afternoons.

http://www.boroughmarket.org.uk/aboutus.html

So long as you stay in an area close to a tube station, you should be able to get to most places fairly easily. As for Harrod's it does get quite crowded before and after Christmas. I won't consider it a MUST destination, unless you're heavily into shopping (at rather inflated rate).
Try theatres, museums. Get a copy of TimeOut magazines. Agree with the recommendation on London walking tour.

Any particular interest?

I'm not a big shopper, particularly of the department store variety.

If you want to shop somewhere unique, go to Covent Garden Market.

As for hotels, both times we stayed at the B&B Cherry Court Hotel -- about $100 USD a night, for a small but clean double. We stayed there twice mostly because of the location and price -- and the good hospitality, but I will warn you breakfast is best skipped and spent at a Starbucks. ;)

http://www.cherrycourthotel.co.uk/

Have a great trip!

Jules