The Original Sightseeing Tour in London, England

Yes, I am a fan of the Hop on Hop Off bus tours in European cities. The 2-hour tour was perfect to get a good lay of the land. We took the HoHo Original London Sightseeing Tour (Yellow route), but there is also a Red route and a Blue route. The fee of about $25 (discounted using the London Pass) or about $30USD gets you admission on all three routes (within a 24 hour period) and the City Cruises river cruise. The Yellow route has a live commentator, the Red route has headsets so you can listen to the commentary in a variety of languages, and the Blue route is the museum route. The commentary was minimal and I didn’t find it as informative as in other cities (NB: Berlin has the best HoHo commentary, Vienna is also very good).

Sights on the Yellow route: Trafalgar Square, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and Parliamentary Buildings, Buckingham Palace (need to get off to take pictures), London Tower, Tower of London, London Eye, Hyde Park, Marble Arch, Green Park.

The HoHo in London wasn’t as good as in other cities and it is very difficult to take pictures of the sights; however it is a good way to familiarize yourself with the sights and plan out which ones deserve a personal visit.