A proper British trip!
I am a self-proclaimed Anglophile and love everything British, the accents, the architecture, the history everything but the Fish and Chips lol! I knew that when I finally got to visit, I would absolutely love it – and London did not disappoint. It reminds me of New York (which I love), but with less trash and prettier buildings. It also has the West End and we all know how much I love musicals
American Airlines had just posted a new credit card offer where you applied for the card, and if you made one purchase on the card, you received 60,000 airline miles. That’s it … ONE purchase. I literally bought a pack of gum and BAM! 60,000 miles showed up in my account a few weeks later. The card had a $95 annual fee, but since 60,000 miles is the price for a round trip economy ticket to Europe, I basically could have an international flight for $95 and a pack of gum. Deb applied for the same card and once we had the 120,000 miles we knew exactly where we wanted to go.
I found that award space was a lot less accessible on AA than it is on United, so we ended up cancelling the card before the year was up. The one thing I did like about AA is they had certain domestic routes on sale each month so you could get a lot of bang for your buck. Now the same AA credit card also has a deal that if you spend a certain amount yearly you can get a companion fare for $99 which is an amazing deal and had that been around when I had the card I may have kept it.
Even with award tickets London is a pretty expensive place to fly into because taxes and fees at London Heathrow are astronomical. These fees add a good amount to your ticket and your “free” flight could actually cost a couple of hundred dollars, especially when the AA flight is actually flown by their partner British Airways. We could have made better use of our miles by flying to another country where sometimes the cost of your award ticket can be as low as $5.60, but it’s where we really wanted to go, there were awards available, and it got us there for a lot less than actually buying a ticket.
I went a little overboard in London because there were so many things I wanted to see, so if you want to visit you may want to trim down your itinerary a bit more than mine. We hit the ground running and never stopped. I keep seeing these Pinterest articles with, “The 100 best things to do in London” and I’m embarrassed to say how many we got done in our week there. Most days we cleared more than 10,000 steps and came home with tired feet, but it was absolutely worth it! As with most international flights from the United States you fly out on the red-eye and get there the following day. So, we had the remainder of the day we arrived, and then 6 whole days to explore this amazing city.
We arrived in Heathrow at about 11:05 a.m. and waited in the Customs line for about 45 minutes. It could have been worse as Heathrow is notorious for having lines that are over 2 hours long so take this into consideration when planning your transportation from the airport. There is an escalator that takes you down to the customs floor and at one point the floor was so full that when people arrived at the bottom of the escalator there was nowhere for them to go so it started bottling up and people began to panic. Luckily someone noticed and they turned off the escalator and held back the line to the escalator for a bit but that could have been mass chaos. We visited In October of 2018, and at the time there was no other option but now travelers with a US Passport that has a chip in it can go through the UK E-customs lines, so hopefully it will be a shorter wait when we visit the next time.
It was about 1:00 p.m. by the time we went through Customs and got into the city. Hotels in London are super expensive, so we stayed at Citadines in Trafalgar square which was more like a studio apartment. The location was great, and we were right between two Tube stations that were easy to get to. We either walked or took the Tube (London’s version of the subway) almost everywhere we went. When we arrived at the airport, the first thing we did was buy a Visitor Oyster Card at the information desk to used on the Tube and we were able to top it off whenever we needed to. There are a number of apps that are great for navigating unfamiliar cities, but my go-to is the Moovit app. This app requires data usage, but it will tell you where you are, and when you put in your destination it will give you a number of ways to get there sorted by length of time or cost. Once you choose an option, it gives you step by step instructions on what to do, which Tube line to take, and when to get off. The only thing we really had to worry about was looking to the right instead of the left when stepping out into the street – I almost got myself mowed over by bicyclists at least twice until I got the hang of it.
We paid a little more for a studio apartment at Citadines because it had a mini kitchen in case we wanted to eat in and keep costs down. That was the plan anyway, all the kitchen really did was serve to hold and heat up all the desserts we brought home and saved for later lol! I think we only actually ate in one night. Since we were early, we went straight to the hotel to ask them to hold our luggage until check in time, but they told us our room was already available and let us check in early. We weren’t sure how tired we would be after traveling all night, so we hadn’t planned much for that first day.
We decided we weren’t overly tired, so we ventured out to explore Covent Garden and ate at Flat Iron. Flat Iron is a Steakhouse that has their own on-site butchers who teach master classes. They start you off with a free appetizer of popcorn which is kind of cool – but the real draw to Flat Iron is the price – £10 (about $13.30 USD) for an amazing steak and a side salad. There aren’t other mains on the menu, just the steak and usually one other beef offering. Their sides are similarly priced with things like creamed spinach at £2.5 and dripping cooked chips (fries with beef fat) at £3. They serve the beef with a mini meat cleaver and on your way out the door they offer you a free dessert – Salted Caramel ice cream rolled in shaved chocolate yum! With the typical prices in London this is a lovely night out that won’t break the bank. Be forewarned though, they don’t take reservations and sometimes the lines are an hour long. They will let you check in and give you a pager though, so you don’t have to sit in the restaurant.
Afterwards we tried to walk off dinner and went across the river to see the London Eye and the Southbank area. I absolutely love Street Art so the first place we went was to the Leake Street Graffiti tunnel. This is a place you would definitely miss if you weren’t looking for it. Just underneath the Waterloo Tube station is a connecting pedestrian tunnel that is filled with street art. This is the Tunnel where Banksy held his “Cans” festival in 2008 and all the great graffiti artists came together and painted the walls of the tunnel. Since then it’s become sort of a canvas for artists and there are new paintings there every week. Take a stroll anytime and you’ll see several artists showing off their talents!
We walked by the Eye and all of the shops around it but didn’t go up. It’s pretty expensive and we figured we’d just have to do it again when we brought my youngest back. With our tummies full, and the feeling that we’d started our journey off right we headed back to the hotel for the night to rest up for the days ahead.
On our first full day we woke up and headed off to walk through Hyde Park on our way to breakfast. Initially we thought that people in London were just very fit as there were so many joggers in the park. Come to find out there was a 5K going on and we felt like absolute slackers watching everyone run by us, but we enjoyed the scenery and cheered everyone on as they went by. The park is HUGE and made for a beautiful walk.
We had breakfast at Sketch in Mayfair. I’m pretty sure this restaurant falls into the “do it for the ‘gram” category, but it was beautiful, nonetheless. Sketch is known for its colorful rooms including the Gallery, which has pink fluffy chairs and walls filled with sarcastic art, the Lecture room which won it two Michelin stars, or the Parlour where all the chairs are adorned in pink ballet slippers. Sketch is pretty pricey so we decided we would have breakfast there instead as it’s a little bit cheaper. We had breakfast in the “Glade” dining room which is one of the prettier rooms there. It’s designed as a mythical forest with trees on the walls and a fluffy carpet designed to look like the forest floor. The room that Sketch is most famous for however is the bathroom! The ceiling is adorned in rainbow tile lights and the stalls themselves are white futuristic looking egg-shaped pods. Many a selfie has been taken in this bathroom. A tip for those of you interested in taking pictures though – the pod bathrooms are not open until 11:30 so if you go for breakfast make sure you schedule your meal at the end of breakfast time so you can catch a glimpse of them. We unfortunately weren’t smart enough to do this and have a reservation to go back when we return.
From there we wandered over to Harrods to see one of the world’s biggest (and most expensive) department stores. There were so many floors and restaurants and displays it was a tad overwhelming. We went upstairs to the Christmas shop to look for an ornament. Everywhere we go we buy an ornament to put on our tree – and this time I was dead set on getting a red phone booth ornament from Harrods. I found one ($30 later) and we were on our way. (More about the ornament saga later).
We’re not traditional foodies, but we did have a list of desserts we wanted to try in London…. So, we passed by Royal Albert Hall to our next stop, the Dominique Ansel bakery. The place is gorgeous, and the desserts are to die for! We tried Frozen s’mores, a cookie shot, and liquid caramel peanut butter mousse cake. I mean, a cookie shot?! A moist, soft chocolate chip cookie shaped as a shot glass served with cold-infused Vanilla Milk inside. Can you say yummm?
Our second dessert stop was supposed to be the Peggy Porschen cakes whose pink walls haunt instragram pictures everywhere – but we were so full at this point that we just took pictures and vowed to come back another day.
We wandered back through Hyde Park to see Kensington palace and the Princess Diana Memorial, stopping along the way to cheer on the stragglers from the 5K as they finally made it past the finish line. Then we wandered through the shopping areas of Oxford and Regents Streets, window shopping at the high-end stores as we passed.
Afterwards we headed over to the Nottinghill area to take a stroll around the pastel colored row houses and shops, shopping at the Portobello Road antique market as we went.
Here we stopped for snacks at Biscuiteers (definitely Insta-worthy with its comic book black and white façade), as well as the hole in the wall, Doughnut Time, where they have flavors such as Netflix ‘N’ Chill (Buttered popcorn glaze, topped with toffee popcorn, mars bars pieces, chocolate beans and fizzy cola boles), or the Violet Beauregarde (Lemon drizzle glaze, exploding with blueberry pie filling topped with Vegan pie crumb!)
Finally, we ended the night at the Sun in Splendour restaurant. The Sunday roast is a tradition in London and since we were there on a Sunday, we definitely wanted to partake. The roast was excellent but being typical Americans, we almost missed out. We originally had reservations for 6 and since we’d had a long day we called to see if we could come earlier – they told us to come on down, and that had we not called the roasts would probably have been gone by 6 – so make sure you book semi-early!
We scheduled a Viator tour to take us on a full day tour outside of London so we could see a little bit of the countryside. We started off at Windsor castle and the grounds were absolutely beautiful. We watched as the tourists tried to distract the Queen’s guards, but they maintained position.
Our next stop was the city of Bath, and a visit to the Roman Bath house. These were used by the Romans for bathing until the 5th Century CE. The water bubbles up through the ground via limestone aquifers with temperatures of 156 and 204 Fahrenheit! No thanks!
The town itself was very cute and I wish we had a little longer to walk around, but we were quickly off to the next stop – lunch at the oldest pub in Lacock, The George Inn. Trying to follow British tradition Deb had Fish & Chips while I had the cottage pie.
Finally, it was off to Stonehenge. I think I had images in my head of stones way out in the middle of an empty field, and they were in a field, but I had to angle my pictures so you couldn’t see the highway right behind it lol! On the typical tours you cannot get close to the stones, but there are a few times in random months that they do special tours where you can go right in the middle if you so choose. So, if that’s what you’re going for, make sure you visit at the right time of year and early in the morning before everyone else arrives.
The following day we woke up and took a stroll along the river Thames, stopping at Shakespeare’s Globe theater. I have a daughter who is a theater major and she was so excited for me visit here. We bought our tickets on Groupon, and then found out that they were only good for the Exhibition, and you couldn’t even take a peek at the actual theater unless you paid more. Needless to say, we were a little miffed. In the exhibit there was a scale model of the theater, and we took a picture of it from just the right angle and sent it to my daughter telling her we had visited. She bought it, and we giggled about it for the rest of the day lol!
If you’re looking for views of London, you typically have to pay for them – unless of course you visit our next stop, the Sky Garden. The Sky Garden is London’s highest public garden and sits atop a 38-story building. The Sky Garden is glassed in and boasts beautiful flowers as well as restaurants with amazing views of the Thames. The best part is you do need a ticket, but admission is absolutely free. Tickets become available 60 days in advance and if you’re interested, book them as soon as you can – they “sell” out fast.
We followed the Sky Garden with a walk through Leadenhall market which is where some of the exterior Diagon Alley scenes in the Harry Potter movies were filmed. If you wander down the Bull’s Head passage you might recognize the blue door of an optics shop which served as the door to the Leaky Cauldron in the Goblet of Fire.
Next up was a traditional afternoon tea at Vertigo 42. Vertigo is a little higher than the Sky Garden, but not by much so we weren’t as impressed with the views as we had just seen them. We did feel a little fancy though as they brought us our champagne and trays of scones and mini desserts – all we were missing was little white gloves!
We went to the Tower of London and took a Beefeater tour of the grounds. The complex is huge and there is so much to see that you really need a tour guide to explain what each building was used for. That’s where the beefeaters come in. The Yeoman Warders (also known as beefeaters) are there to share stories of old and set off on tours every 30 minutes. The tours are free and included in your ticket price. The highlight of the visit is of course the Jewel House and the crown jewels. Here you’ll see crowns and diamonds some of which are still used by the Queen today in important national ceremonies – Keep an eye out for the “in use” signs.
On the way back to the West End we stopped at Buckingham Palace to get the obligatory picture at the gate. Buckingham Palace is the official residence of the Queen. The Royal Standard Flag flies from the palace when the Queen is in residence, and the Union Flag flies from the Palace when the Queen is not in residence The State Rooms are open to the public for 10 weeks each summer, and on limited dates during the Spring and Winter. I have to admit I was distracted by the distinctive looking gentleman standing next to us wearing a beautiful suit, a cheetah skin hat complete with tail, and carrying a beautiful wood staff with decorative feathers along with his briefcase. I was positive they were remaking the movie Coming to America, but I guess he was just a visitor too lol!
We had dinner at Jamie’s Italian owned by Chef Jamie Oliver, where I had 12-hour braised beef Tortellini (Pasta stuffed with low & slow Barolo-braised beef in a rich beef & sage butter, topped with lemony gremolata & Parmesan) and D had Chianti Beef (Slow-braised beef, pumpkin purée, red wine & rosemary sauce & grated horseradish). I am well aware Jamie’s is a chain, but we still felt posh eating at one of his restaurants anyway lol!
Next we walked over to the Apollo Victoria theater to see one my all-time favorites – Wicked! I know, I know, but I’ve seen it in every other city so why not here? I must confess I wasn’t sure if the actors would have British accents in the show, but they didn’t, and it was just as wonderful as it was in the US. If you’re never seen Wicked it tells the story of Elphaba, before she became the Wicked Witch of the West. In a turn of events, Elphaba was the good witch fighting for justice but was framed by the Wizard and outcast by the citizens of Oz. Glinda the good witch, or Galinda as she was known back then, was Elphaba’s best friend and she was left to rule Oz after Elphaba faked her own death in the form of a bucket of water thrown on her by Dorothy. The Act 1 closer, Defying Gravity moved me so much I have a tattoo saying just that on my ankle!
The next morning it was a little drizzly, so we visited the Seven Dials area and the British Museum. This a beautiful museum that houses art like the Rosetta Stone – and like many museums in London – admission is free! If you like museums but don’t have a lot of time to spend there, something we do is Google the Museum we’re visiting and type in “must see”. Someone will have already listed the things you can’t miss and tell you exactly where they to find them.
We also took a peek in Neal’s Yard, a colorful little courtyard that is one of the prettiest streets in London. Neal’s Yard is a small alley in London’s Covent Garden between Shorts Gardens and Monmouth Street which opens into a courtyard. It is named after the 17th century developer, Thomas Neale. Inside the yard is the Whole Food Warehouse, Neal’s Yard Coffee House, Neal’s Yard Bakery, Neal’s Yard Dairy, Neal’s Yard Apothecary, Casanova & daughters, and Wild Food Cafe.
For our snack cravings we went to Hip Chips. This is a neat concept where you can get either salty or sweet chips and then pick multiple dips to go with them like Moroccan Yogurt, Katsu Curry, or on the sweet side Chocolate Mousse or Campfire S’mores!
To go with it we wandered over to the Starbucks Reserve, which is a new concept for Starbucks, the stores are huge, beautifully decorated, and filled with reserve coffees you can’t get anywhere else. Debbie collects Starbucks mugs from everywhere we go so this was a MUST!
Next up we wandered through China Town and marveled at Shuang Shuang, a hot pot restaurant where patrons sit at the bar in front of a sushi style conveyor belt where you can grab whatever food catches your eye on its way by. Prices are determined by the color of the plates.
Next we took the Tube to Kings Cross Station and visited Platform 9 ¾ made famous in the Harry Potter books. There is a store in the station filled with Harry Potter gifts and right out front is a sign for the Platform with a luggage cart “disappearing” into the wall. The gift store staffs a person out front who lets you choose your house scarf (Of course I chose Slytheryn and Deb chose Ravenclaw) and take your picture for you with your camera at no charge. There are a lot of Potterheads in this world, so expect to have to wait a little to get your picture taken.
Next we visited Saint Pancras and the British Library. The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and the largest library in the world by number of items catalogued. It is estimated to contain 170–200 million-plus items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British Library receives copies of all books produced in the United Kingdom and Ireland. I am such a sucker for a beautiful library and this one definitey fits the bill. Imagine 6 stories of books in dark wood and glass cases from ceiling to floor. 
After that it was back to the West End to see a proper British Musical, Everybody’s Talking About Jamie. This was a really cute pop show about a 16-year-old boy who has decided he wants to be a drag queen. Jamie has to “come out” at school and the show is really his journey to discover himself. There are the typical villains, the school principal, the bully at school, and his bigoted father, but Jamie triumphs and becomes his true self. It took me a few minutes to get used to hearing all the accents, but I really enjoyed the show. Soon after we arrived back home Jamie was playing in movie theaters in the US for a few days, I took a group of friends and I don’t think there was a dry eye in the house after the song, “He’s my boy”.
Day 5 started by taking the Tube to Camden Town and one of my favorite London markets – Camden Market. It’s really a couple of different markets and I could wander around for hours looking at all the wares they have for sale and trying snacks at the food stalls. This is actually where we bought our London souvenir, a large standing Turkish lamp. We probably should have waited until we visited Turkey, but we both fell in love with it and it is an amazing reminder of our trip. We even bought a few Banksy prints here to decorate our bathroom back home. There were so many quirky shops, like the Cereal Killer café, a nostalgic eatery with more than 120 kinds of cereal and toppings. The food stalls were the best though and we had gourmet Mac and Cheese from The Mac Factory, and Steak and Chips from Stakehouse served, “classic” with egg on top. Next time I want to try Ghetto Grillz or Tacoma’s Death by Taco. Check out this line up!
Next we headed over to Shoreditch to take an Unseen Street Art Tour. Unseen employs homeless people with knowledge of art and the area to guide the tours and help them earn money to obtain housing at the same time. Shoreditch has some incredible street art and our guide Henri walked us around talking not only about the art and the area, but the plight of the homeless in London. Henri told us he graduated from London Arts college and worked as an artist and painter for 7 years before he fell on hard times and became homeless. Since he has started working for Unseen, he has been able to stop begging and is no longer living on the street. The concept is absolutely fabulous and a win/win for all involved. The street art in Shoreditch is amazing and I got to see a couple more Banksy’s which made my day!
After the Unseen Tour we stopped for what Debbie thought was dinner at the Breakfast Club in Shoreditch. Imagine her surprise when we approached the hostess and I told her we were there to see the Mayor of Scaredy Cat Town. The hostess made sure no one was looking, then led us to a refrigerator that was up against the wall, knocked on it three times and opened the door. We then walked through the refrigerator to a stairway and secret speakeasy bar below where we had a drink. It was very cool, but make sure you make a reservation and know the password! 
On the way back to the West End we walked through the boxpark and had ice cream at Soft Serve Society. A charcoal coconut soft serve ice cream with marshmallow fluff on a chocolate cone… Yum!
Tonight’s dinner was Mexican, one of my favorites! We ate at Wahaca and had Grilled chicken & avocado street tacos with ancho rub, guacamole & green tomatillo salsa, pork pibil quesadilla, slow cooked in citrus & spices, grilled with cheese., Mexican grilled corn with habanero mayo, dusted with finely grated cheese & chilli sugar salt, Sweet potato crispy fried chunks tossed in smoky caramelized garlic mojo de ajo. This right here is where my love for Mexican Street corn started!
This time we saw Harry Potter and the Cursed child Part 1. If you’re not familiar with the Harry Potter show, it is in two parts, and you can either watch both parts on the same day (which is about 6 hours of ass in seat watching, no thanks!) or on two consecutive nights like we did. I have to admit, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the show – I loved the books but wasn’t sure how I’d like it in play form. It was SPECTACULAR. The story was good, but it was the scene transitions and special effects that made the show. I truly thought there might be some Death eaters waiting for us outside the theater after the first show lol!
On our final full day, we walked over to Westminster. We happened to be walking by when the Royal Horseman changed personnel and that was a nice treat.
We saw the actual changing of the guard inspection at the guard barracks. This occurs at the guard barracks just prior to the changing of the guard in front of Buckingham Palace. We actually chose to do this instead of watching the actual change because there are less people here and you can get better pictures as they walk over to the palace. We visited Westminster Abbey and saw the Prime Minister’s residence from the street.
Unfortunately, Big Ben was under construction and will be for several years, so we’ll have to come back for that one. We rounded out the day with a trip to the Tate Modern museum which has free entry and ended up back in the West End to watch the second half of Harry Potter. Tickets to London shows are much cheaper than to their counterparts in the US. We met several people who said they came to London to see shows like Hamilton or Harry Potter because they were sold out in the US and because for the price they would have paid in New York for the show and a hotel it wasn’t much more to fly to London – so why not? Totally my kind of logic!
I absolutely loved my trip to London and am so glad we went. When we got home, I told the kids about our trip and showed them the ornament I had gotten at Harrods. It was so expensive that I told them that I had to be the one to hang it on the tree, because if they broke it, I’d be angry. Of course, you know what Karma did then don’t you? I got on the ladder to hang the ornament, placed it on the tree, and it slid down the tree and broke on the tile floor. There was complete silence for a few minutes as 5 pairs of eyes watched me to see what would happen next. I calmly got down from the ladder and walked over to the computer to see if I could buy another one online. I could, but my $30 ornament was now $66 with shipping. I looked up, said, “I’ll just have to go get another one then”, and promptly booked a ticket for Christmas time in 2019! When people ask why we’re going to London again, Debbie likes to say, “because she broke an ornament” 
Thinking of visiting London and want to see some specific tips or other blog posts for the city? Click here
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