London Itinerary 13 day advice

I think your plan to tour the Royal Albert Hall and Kensington Palace on the day you arrive is something you should change. You will be exhausted from travel and won’t appreciate either the Royal Albert Hall or Kensington Palace.

Stay outside. You wrote about walking around Hyde Park and also getting a bite to eat. Those are good ideas. You don’t want to do anything inside whether it is to tour a palace, visit a museum, or wander through a church/cathedral.

Maybe walk along the Thames on the south bank. Maybe take a boat ride on the Thames in which you are outside.

We have been to Belfast twice and loved the city and the Giant's Causeway north of the city.

Sorry, but flying all the way to Belfast just to see the Titanic Museum is a bit much.

Sure, we didn't even go to the museum based on what others told us about it, but I can if you are that interested in the museum, save it for a trip where you can spend more time in Belfast and Northern Ireland.

I would like to add some suggestions. Have you considered the London Walks. They are great and I have taken five walks and plan to take more next year when I return to London. Google London Walks and you will see all the days they offer the different walks and they have great day trips ( I have not taken the day trips but heard they are very good and plan to take a few next year) and they offer pub walks which is for everyone and are great. I took three, they take you on a walk, you go to three pubs and have time for one drink each pub and the third pub they leave you there to stay as long as you wish. They always meet at a tube station and end at a tube station. Great way to get to know an area of the city and learn about that area. The great thing is no reservations and you show up to take the walk and if it rains you don't have to go!

You said you want to go to Picadilly, they have a walk and that may be more fun than so going to see it.

I would get a reservation for the Churchill War rooms as that has been very popular. I would buy the RS London book as that offers a lot of information about transporation, passes, pubs, walks and a map. Do get a tube map or download the tube map.

I would make reservations if you want to go somewhere nice for tea and if you want to go to Windsor Castle or Kensingston Palace or St Pauls do go on their websites and you may get a small discount if you buy your tkts in advance and not have to wait on long lines to enter.

I went to Buckingham palace and it was wonderful, I bought the tkt in advance ( need to do that if you want to go) and went to the Queen's Gallery ( to see the art collection), the Queen's mews to see the carriages and the palace itself which is huge. It took most of the day there but good to see now as the palace is only open from Aug to end of Sept each year as the Queen is in Scotland.

Windsor Castle is wonderful and I went and spend most of the day there and the town which is nice. I saw the changing of the guard there and that is a bit less crowded than at Buckingham Palce and I went early and stood at the front, behind the rope. Great view and stayed fo all of it. I would go there instead of Buckingham Palace.

Your days are croweded with stuff, which is fine, but remember you may not see it all. You may want to stay somewhere longer, or taking the tube can take a while, plus sitting down to eat which is necessary for fuel and rest so expect to see half the stuff but what you do see and do is worth it and wonderful.

And expect rain, so plan a back up to go to museums and spend time there until you can go outside again.

I hope this helps. As I said go to the websites of the places you want to visit to see if you need to buy tkts in advance, and it will of course show the times, days open and closed and if anything is closed for repairs.

Have a great time!

As you can see we are not big Museum people.

You say that, but you have Tower of London, Churchill War Rooms, Titanic Museum and British Museum in your itinerary, so I'm not sure how much time you actually want to dedicate to those. We were at the Tower from 9:00-3:30 last Fall. It was easily the favourite of the sites we visited. If you're really not museum people, I'd reconsider the British Museum, lots of cool stuff but the most 'museumy' of the 3 in London. Never been to the Titanic Museum but sounds like a fun day trip adventure. I've never experienced a flight from Heathrow to Ireland before so maybe it won't be an issue just be warned that Heathrow can be a nightmare for security and add plenty of time. It's an airport I'd prefer to avoid.

In case you don’t have enough to do, check out the special events offered during the Totally Thames festival, which goes on all of September.

https://totallythames.org/

I would recommend NOT doing the hop on hop off bus on your first day. I did it with my daughters and we were nodding off the entire time. Not a good activity when you're jet lagged.

I would recommend doing Salisbury and Stonehenge as a London Walks tour. We did it this way and it was great. Very knowledgeable tour guide. We enjoyed it very much.

Great feedback. Reviewed our itinerary and changing some things around.
Day 1: Due to the consensus HOHO out and Kensington Palace change to day 5
Decided walking Hyde Park area, Thames River cruise and familiarizing ourselves.
The British Museum and Churchill War Rooms took out, possible back up for rainy day.
Day 2: Shakespeare Globe and Borough market changed to day 11
Day 4: Stonehenge only - still deciding on our own by train or bus tour
Day 9: yes.. no Abbey Studio tours
Day 10- Windsor castle by itself - train
Looking into some London walks
Still tweaking some days but I'm sure once we're there we can be flexible and also taking into account weather

Appreciated all the daily informative feedback Emma and Ann...the specific details help for understanding areas. Googling and mapping sometimes don't make sense