Things to Do in London, England for First Time Visitors

Things to Do in London, England for First Time Visitors

[0:00 -0:31] Welcome to the Everyday Bucket List Podcast. Get ideas, tips, and inspiration from locals, subject matter experts, and yours truly to pursue travel goals and other bucket list ideas, both big and small. We saw something that was unique to London and it was the mousetrap.

It was the Agatha Christie story and there are a lot of modern musicals going on. I think it's Wicked is very big there. There were other ones, Hamilton.

[0:41 - 0:49] Hey, everyone. We are so happy to be back. Once again, we're happy that you are back with us.

[0:49 - 2:52] It's me, Karen Cordova, your host and author of the Everyday Bucket List book. Hey, everyone. We're super excited.

We got back from London a few weeks ago and we can't wait to tell you all about it. Unless you live on another planet and you never heard of London, London, to me, what comes to mind right away, what it's known for are royals and pubs and tabloids and iconic buildings like Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. There is so much more to explore there.

The culture and the people are so much fun. We can't wait to talk about it with you. If you've been wondering, do I have some sort of hole on my bucket list of places to visit? This might be it.

We don't want you to have a hole in your bucket or your list, so definitely stay tuned and listen in on what we did and what we think are must-see attractions. We'll fill you in on restaurants and we'll tell you what to avoid and some mistakes that we made along the way that we hope you take these tips and learn from us. Starting off, my number one thing is Big Ben.

You can see it from a tourist bus, you can see it from a regular bus, or you can take the bus there to take pictures with Big Ben in the background. It's a fun spot, there's loads of people there, but it's still manageable, at least for when we went in April. You could get a touristy pic and put your finger on top of Big Ben.

It's just a silly thing to do. I noticed these people, they put on UK hats, they bought these hats and took a picture with Big Ben in the background. I guess it just depends on how touristy you want to be or what is your of an awesome picture with a big iconic place to visit in the background.

[2:54 - 8:05] Yeah, I was amazed that all those famous places were all in one area. For example, there was Big Ben, it was right next to the London Eye, and it was right next to Westminster Abbey, so we were able to just walk around in that area and get some good pics all in the span of half an hour or so. Yeah, so literally Big Ben and Westminster Abbey are right across the street from each other.

The architecture is very beautiful, that's where the royals get married, take a tour, you have to pay to go in, and it's really just an amazing sight. You see these things on TV and then you can't believe you're there and you're able to see all of this, so that was very exciting. Also, there's this little park and they have statues.

I want to say there was Gandhi and Mandela and other people that were actually from England as well, and it was just a nice spot to take pictures, walk around, you could sit a little bit, so that was a lot of fun. Moving on, Buckingham Palace, you have to see that if this is your first time. It's another spot that I couldn't believe I was there.

We were located close by, our hotel was a 10-minute walk to Buckingham Palace, so that was actually one of the first things that we did. Yeah, we caught the end of the changing of the guards, so it was interesting to see them go through the process of that. It's really formal, but you can tell that there's a lot of history there, and I don't know how long they've been doing that, but I'm sure it's a few hundred years.

According to HouseholdDivision.org, it has been over 520 years. Right, and that all depends on when you go, how much you like crowds, can you get there to be up close to the fence before everyone else, and I don't know if people are pushing or whatever. We were more on the side, not where a ton of people were, so we were able to snap photos and take videos from the side, so that was fun.

Also, we went to the Sky Garden. Observation decks in general are super popular everywhere. London has a lot of great ones, and this one was free.

I could not believe it was free. It was so beautiful. You can walk all around.

They show you where things are located, so there's these little signs. If you're looking for Tower Bridge or the Shard or any other significant places in the London skyline or in this view, you can catch those, and you can also relax. You could just get something to drink or a little snack, but they also have places where you can have a formal dinner.

I think it was close to six o'clock where the people who were sitting, they let you know people have reservations at this time, but it's very relaxing. That was one of the special things that we did while there. I thought everything was special, but it was really unbelievable.

Like I said, I couldn't believe it was free. You have to get reservations in advance, so I want to say I did it two to three weeks in advance. There was availability on a Monday.

Check the website because it'll tell you when you should go on there and just snag a spot. The only downside is if you pick a day where it's rainy or cloudy, it might not be as great, but we took our chances, and we thought it was really nice. It was a great place to unwind.

We went there later in the afternoon, so we were kind of tired, and we just sat there and had drinks and enjoyed the view. Right, and definitely take note of places that are inside because, like many people say, the weather is very temperamental. It could rain, but then it could be sunny, so it's really nice to take note of places that you can go inside and still have an enjoyable time.

It was a great view for sure. Moving on, we loved all of the bridges that we were able to see on this trip. There's Tower Bridge, London Bridge, and the Millennium Bridge.

The Millennium one is more modern. The bridge is more plain. We walked over that.

I still thought it was fun. You get to wave to people who go by on a boat. It's just a lot of fun to cross over bridges.

We also did that for the Millennium Bridge. This is something that if you're a couple, it could be like a nice romantic thing. If you're traveling with friends, whatever, it's also fun to do.

Even with kids, kids get a kick out of seeing boats. I think at one point a tugboat went under, so that was like a draw for people. You could really see up close when you're looking off of the bridge.

You could even go on one of the boats if you wanted to use it for transportation to get from one point to another. If you plot out your itinerary a certain way, that could be another exciting thing to do. Also, I think a must-do-or-see thing is a musical.

As a heads up, Karen keeps saying musical, but she also means play. Obviously, if you hate musicals, then don't do it. But we saw something that was unique to London, and it was the Mousetrap.

It was the Agatha Christie story. There are a lot of modern musicals going on. I think it's Hadestown.

[8:06 - 10:24] Wicked is very big there. There were other ones. Hamilton.

You can get tickets in advance. You get discounts if you're more flexible and you could do the day of. We wanted to make sure that we had tickets, so we ordered in advance.

Like I said, I enjoyed it because I love musicals and I wanted something unique to London. I don't know if the Mousetrap is for everyone. I was into Agatha Christie in middle school, so it was kind of fun to revisit that story.

I think if you're there, why not? Anytime you could be flexible with what you do, if you have these set things that you're doing, you're like, hey, we're in this area. Why don't we try to do this? That is a way to maximize your time there. Yeah, we ordered our tickets before our trip.

One little tip, we got our tickets in the stalls. We got it so we had leg room because it's kind of tight in there. Those buildings are older and they're built for people at a time that were a lot smaller than we are now in 2024.

We got seats that were, there was an aisle in front of us, so we had plenty of leg room. I can't recommend that enough because I know the people I saw that weren't in our row were really jammed in there. Yeah, we like to pick that in general.

We like to be the first row of the second section, so there's a lot of leg room. That's a really good tip that you pointed out, Rich. This area, I want to say, was close to Seven Dials.

I can have Rich explain what Seven Dials is. It was a really fun area and we can even explain where to eat. Yeah, Seven Dials is a little area in a neighborhood in Covent Garden where there's seven rows that converge into this little roundabout and there's like a little sundial in the middle.

It's just a cool little place to take pictures. People are sitting in the middle of the roundabout on the dial and there's all kinds of cool little shops and interesting little cafes. We got ice cream at a little place right off of one of those streets and then we also found the Seven Dials Public Food Market, which I'll let Kara explain.

Right. I heard about this. It's actually, I believe, it's a more recent thing and it's another place where you can go indoors, which I think whenever you're on a trip and you don't know what the weather's going to be like, it's great to put this into your itinerary.

[10:25 - 12:55] It was such a lively place to eat. There are so many different types of ethnic cuisine and there's a lot of seating. We had tacos.

I'll have to have a little robot look up the exact name of the restaurant. It was called Los Gordos. And most places, I want to say, there are a variety of like gluten-free, vegan.

And I heard about this place that had gluten-free items and sometimes I'll just pick vegan too, just to try something different. They had these awesome mushroom tacos and they had some sort of like crispy, like crunchy onions on top. It was just really good.

So here you are eating this great food and there's like this lively atmosphere. You can sit in the individual restaurants if there's seating, sometimes there's limited seating, or you could just kind of come out and you're overlooking the seating below and there's a DJ and all these lights. I almost felt like I was at a club.

It was kind of all different age groups. It wasn't like just a 20 something thing. And in general, it always seems like there's a variety of age groups.

I've experienced that in Europe where you don't feel out of place if there's younger people there. It's kind of like everybody is together unless, you know, obviously this is my first time, but you know, it was a great experience. Okay.

Another restaurant that we went to right before the musical, it was called Browns. And this was one of our only sit down places. And one of the reasons why I don't normally do sit down is because it takes a while.

I rather sightsee than just eat something unless it's like truly special or you can only get it in the area. This place was really, really good. It's very pretty.

It has a really nice atmosphere. You feel very comfortable. There were a lot of people with casual clothes, but not super casual.

So it's something where, you know, if you walk in in or whatever during lunchtime, you won't feel awkward. And the food was just really good. Rich had like a traditional English type of meal.

I just had chicken and I think it was like a kale salad, but it was really seasoned really well. But the only drawback was it took a while. And, you know, a lot of these restaurants, you can stay a lot longer in Europe and we really needed to get out and go to the musical.

So that you have to think about when you're planning. Yeah. I ordered the chicken and leek pie and it also came with mashed potatoes on the side.

[12:55 - 15:16] And it was by far my favorite meal of the trip because the pie was like, you could tell it was fresh. The crust was crispy. And then I remember telling you that it wasn't like a large, you know, pie.

It didn't look like it was going to be that big, you know, in terms of me eating it. But there was so much chicken in it that it just, it just, I just kept eating, you know, more chicken. So I was full afterward.

It was just an awesome meal. Right. We wanted to try some things that were from the area that you can only have in England, but there's so much international cuisine.

It's just, you have to try a variety in my opinion. And another thing that we did, we had a traditional English breakfast, which some people might say, well, it's eggs and, you know, potatoes or whatever. You know, they actually serve beans and they have roasted tomatoes.

We really wanted a full English breakfast just to say that we did it. And we went to the breakfast club that was near Chinatown. The people were nice.

I think it was like maybe those $2 signs, you know. $2 signs, meaning the symbol for the price points. It's a lot to pay for eggs, but like I said, we're there.

We just wanted to do it and we really liked it. And if you need a fast, casual restaurant, we hit up this place a lot. It was called Leon, you know, once again, gluten-free, vegan, a lot of different options.

They have wraps. We actually had this chicken satay in a box and they serve it with rice and they also have breakfast there. We went there and they had these little pots and it's literally like a little cup with an egg or two in it with avocado and salmon.

It's like, oh, I wish they had this in the States. You know, it was like healthy, it was quick. And, you know, I couldn't say enough about it.

I definitely hit up that spot a lot. And it's, you know, economical. It's a great place for kids if you don't have to worry, like keeping them quiet.

And there's a variety of options there. So, you know, you could keep everybody happy. And they even have arancini, which is something that people have in Sicily.

Obviously, you could get it in different parts of the world. And they had gluten-free arancini. I was blown away.

And whether you're gluten-free or not, everything tasted so awesome. And another place I wanted to mention is Cutter and Squidge. They serve tea.

You can get scones there and other desserts. Excuse me. I just wanted to mention that the scones in London are plainer.

[15:16 - 16:33] You can put clotted cream and jam on them. They are delicious and go great with tea. If you don't have time for a formal afternoon tea, they also have gluten-free options.

I really loved it. They were nice in there. It's a cute little spot.

And, you know, definitely worth checking out. Chinatown is really cool. I had ice cream there.

I had, like, I believe it was Filipino ice cream. And the flavor was uve. So it was like this cool purple ice cream.

And, you know, I can't say enough about it. I cannot wait to go back. So now we also wanted to just give pointers for anyone really, but also to couples or kids.

This could very easily just be very romantic. Like I said, you could go on a boat ride. You could go over the bridge, go to a fancy restaurant if you feel like you want it to be romantic.

You know, with kids, we found it so easy to get around. The double-decker buses were so awesome. We were sitting and there was a mom who put her kid on the top.

We liked going on the top because we can't do that here, you know, maybe in New York, but those are just like tourist buses. But the red double-deckers, you can also just, you know, get a regular one in London. So we liked going to the top and you could see right in the front.

And there was these little kids who really wanted to sit in the front. And there was a seat on one side, not on the other. And the mom just put these, they look like three or four.

[16:33 - 17:07] They just wanted to sit in the front. And we ended up asking her if she wanted to switch with us so she could sit near her kids. So, you know, that's a fun experience for kids.

Even the tube, like we were saying, in that area, we're on the Elizabeth line, it felt very manageable. You know, we got around just with credit cards. It's very much a cashless society.

But if you do decide to take public transportation, I want to say at least on the tube, you have to get an Oyster card because each person has to pay for themselves. Right. You need the Oyster card if you bring children because your credit card can only be used by one person to track when you get on and off the tube.

[17:08 - 17:55] Then they know how to charge you appropriately. So, you know, if you have a credit card where you're getting on the tube, you have to keep that credit card and use the same one when you're getting off because they want to know how long you've been on the transportation. But like I said, when you're on the tube, you would need an Oyster card because obviously a little kid's not going to have a credit card.

And, you know, I just felt like there's so much to do there. You could bring your kid to a play if you think they can endure that. Rich, what did you think? You know, there's also like parks and stuff.

You know, it's all gauging like what you think your kid could handle. But there are places where you can just, you know, stop and unwind a little bit if they need to decompress a little bit, if you have like a little too much activity. There's also, you know, street performers.

[17:55 - 19:03] That's a lot of fun. People, you know, have their kids on their shoulders or there's places where you could sit a little high up so you can watch. And there's ice cream places.

And, you know, I think the casual spots lend themselves to being a little more kid-friendly because you could be in and out and there's a variety of things. They even had chicken nuggets at that Leon place. For couples, definitely Sky Garden is a place where you'd want to visit.

Like Kara said, make sure you get your reservation tickets before you go to London though. And the other thing is, I read that London is considered the world's most walkable city. And I found that to be true.

We walked around a lot. We took a lot of public transportation, but walking was so pleasant that it's just, you know, a really interesting experience. And when we got tired, we would go into a cafe and, you know, get a cup of tea and a little snack.

And then we just kept going. So it's really a great place to walk. And that's when you discover interesting little neighborhoods too and little streets and shops.

So I would definitely suggest that couples spend some time walking around London. Right. And another thing that's very popular is sometimes people hire photographers when they go to, you know, this big epic bucket list location, or sometimes if somebody's engaged or whatever, your anniversary, special occasion, or just for the fun of it.

[19:03 - 19:56] And I was listening to this other podcast called UK Travel Planning, and she has a photographer that's been on a few different episodes that she's for hire, or she'll even tell you locations of where you should take photos. So if you're that person when you travel and you really want to get all those great photos, that's something to check out. That is the UK Travel Planning podcast.

It is episode 94. Another place that we didn't mention is Neil's Yard that is near Seven Dials. That's like an Instagrammable spot.

And, you know, it's a lot of fun. Definitely you can take so many photos. And if you can hire someone, that would be, you know, a really cool thing to do.

And I just wanted to mention a few mistakes, which, you know, I don't think anybody's 100% perfect, but you can buy a travel adapter for, you know, your phone. You have to be careful with like a hairdryer. You have to really look into the details of what you can use it for.

[19:57 - 21:37] Some of the hotels have them for you. So we bought two of them, not knowing that the hotel provided that. But at the same time, we were happy to have our adapter because sometimes when you're out and you're using like your phone for maps, you could kind of drain your battery or you're taking a lot of photos and videos.

So it was nice to have it on us because if we stopped for coffee, we could just, you know, re-up our cell, you know, charge. So that's something to keep in mind. Another thing is make sure you check your credit cards transaction fees.

Some people don't have, you know, any fees. I know like the Discover card doesn't and Chase Sapphire. Unfortunately, we use one of our cards and there was like a 3% charge on everything that we purchased.

And it's funny because we ended up getting 3% back. So we were kind of like at zero. We broke even on that, but it's good to keep in mind.

And you know, the other thing is because I did make reservations for the musical and the Sky Garden, I didn't leave enough time in my schedule for afternoon tea. So I was really bummed out about that. So if you really want to have afternoon tea, make sure, you know, it's only at a certain time.

Some people have it like 12 to 3 or 12 to 4. Some people start later and there's a variety of places you can do it. There's a variety of price points. You know, if it's something you really want to do, you just have to nail it down on your schedule and say, okay, these are the things I definitely want to do.

But we were thinking about if we went back, what would we like to do? And that was like one of the biggest things I wanted to do. So I was really bummed out. And I just wasn't thinking about that.

And I would like to get closer to Tower Bridge. We saw it from the Sky Garden and were able to view it from other areas. It's just where we were at the time, it would have been like a long walk and we're like already tired.

[21:37 - 21:52] And, you know, we had other areas we wanted to visit. So I would definitely try to walk over Tower Bridge. Another thing, I would probably see another musical like Wicked or try to do more of the last minute thing and have more flexible plans and kind of like do more of an outline.

[21:53 - 22:33] I don't really like to be tied to reservations unless I absolutely have to. So that is something to keep in mind. I would probably try other observation decks.

There's another one close by to the Sky Garden that you don't need a reservation. So that's another thing to keep in mind. I think it's Garden at 120.

So that would be a nice place to visit another time. And Rich, is there anything else that when you go back, you'd want to, you know, hit these other places that we didn't go to? Just the Tower Bridge is someplace that we didn't get a chance to visit that I want to definitely visit next time. Right.

And I think maybe Notting Hill, Greenwich. Greenwich has the Prime Meridian. And it just depends how you want to plot everything out.

[22:33 - 23:18] I usually pick the spots that I want to see these things the most. And then you get the most bang for your buck in the area like in terms of like, okay, this is close to this. And then we could go eat here or some of the markets.

They're very popular. We went to Borough Market. But you definitely want to plot out, okay, we could go to this market.

Then we could see this big epic thing. Going to Greenwich just seemed a little out of our way at this time. But like I said, we would love to go back and, you know, see the Prime Meridian and hit up some other markets maybe.

Or go to places where like there's music history. We were able to see Abbey Road, which we had to go a little bit out of our way and find the bus to go there. But it was worth it.

[23:19 - 24:01] And that is pretty much it. If you have any questions, feel free to hit me up on X, I still call it Twitter, at KarenCordway, K-A-R-E-N, C as in cat, O-R-D-A-W-A-Y. You can also email me at hello at karencordway.com. I love your questions and thank you so much for listening.

Please share this episode if you know someone who can get use out of it. And also check out my Buy Me a Coffee page if you would like to support the show. We have arrived at our destination.

You can unfasten your seatbelts and we'll see you next time for another episode of the Everyday Bucket List Podcast. Bye!