London for 4 days best public transport options?
 

Oyster card or what? I`ve seen many of the major attractions in earlier visits,so I really do only want the transport component of a pass/ticket.

Based on the limited info you have provided, I suggest an Oyster card,loaded with pay-as-you-go funds. You definitely don't want to pay for single fare tickets, even for 4 days.

You can buy a paper ticket still for London transport but you will find the Oyster Card fares much cheaper. You could put £20 on it to start then top up at a machine as you go along. Look at fares on www.tfl.gov.uk

I would suggest buying an Oyster Card on arrival at Heathrow (assuming that's where you land). If you think you will never return, you can try cashing it in before you leave but we had trouble doing that. If you might return, hang on to it as the card does not expire.

Kay

Oyster fares are neither cheaper nor dearer than Travelcard fares.

A PAYG option on Oyster is PROBABLY better suited to a visitor unsure of their precise plans than a Travelcard - but the only person who knows for sure which will work out cheaper is the unheard-of visitor who knows exactly what journeys she's going to have, at what time and on what day, and carries out exactly those journeys.

As walkabout says, the crucial thing is not to pay cash fares. If you don't want the 2-for 1 entry deal, fine-tuning your electronic pass is the short road to insanity - but only the visitor herself can do the calculation if she's that way minded. For most people, especially travelling in from LHR and possibly going to parts of Greenwich or Hampton Court, an Oyster minimises your chances of making a mistake.

But it's still a few coppers' difference.

Even for 4 days in London I get a 7 day travelcard put on my oOyster brI tend to take a LOT of tubes and Buses. I don't feel the need to walk from place to palce and I cover a lot of teritory!

Either get a travelcard or put one on Oyster, no difference on prices.

Just make sure you aren't paying per tube/bus, that works out terribly expensive.

eurocheapo.com/london see "getting around"

Thanks everybody! an Oyster card it is.
Susielou.

Four days in London is almost surely oyster card Pay as you go (PAYG) turf not 7 day travelcard turf because of the capping. Bear in mind oyster cards require a £5 deposit and for each day will cap at what the price would be for a one day travelcard meeting whatever conditions you impose on it by your style of travel (do you start out after 0930 on a weekday and any time on a weekend represents one kind of cap an off peak one day card cap or do you start out before 0930 on a weekday where the cap would be a peak period one day travelcard price. If you just use buses the cap is the price of a one day bus ticket (which no longer exists except as a cap on oyster PAYG)..if you don't reach the cap on a given day you pay for each trip individually far less than cash fares and obviously say if your plans for the day include one round trip say from hotel to dinner, theatre and back to the hotel, you don't want to pay for two single trips, if you do't use the oyster card PAYG then your alternative is a one day traelcard and you're sort of out the difference between two single trips on oyster and the cost of a one day travelcard.

The fly in the ointment, of course, as we've discussed here are those 2 for discounts offered by the national rail companies which require tickets on national rail ticket stock not available at tube stations which are run by tfl (transport for London)...the secret there is if you know of the 2 for 1's and print the vouchers, the day before you do a 2 for 1 as part of your travelling that day, you stop by a national rail office and buy a one day travecard for the next day from them and use that card for your transport to and fro the 2 for 1 attractions. This is discussed elsewhere here.

Other than that bearing in mind whatever funds are left on a PAYG account embeded in every oyster card as well as the deposit are refundable at your last stop in London on the day you leave although they don't expire and ou can keep them for your next trip or give them to friends or family visiting London in the future

It really isn't all that much to understand. The oyster card system really does work well.