There are four of us that will be in London at the end of our two weeks in Bath, Wales & Cotswolds. We have the usual suspects for London but we've never heard anything about the Westminster Palace parliament tour. The only thing available is the audio tour. Is this worth the time? We only have Oct 2 and 3 for anything we want to do in London.
Warren & Kathy
Posted by
Olympia, WA, USA
6713 posts
We did one years ago and it was great. Here's more.
Posted by
207 posts
How far in advance can you usually book the live guide tour?
Posted by
OP
5 posts
When I looked, guided tours were booked until 3 December. It looks like they only book about 60 days out. They open new dated the second Wednesday of every month so in a couple of days new days will be added.
Posted by
Virginia
898 posts
It's been quite a few years, but when I toured Houses of Parliament I used the audio tour and was quite happy with it. I do not feel like I missed out on any information, I could go at my own pace and linger longer at a place where something caught my attention. Best of all I was visiting one of those places I had only read about or seen on TV watching some Parliamentary debate.
Posted by
in MD near DC
32 posts
I took two Parliament tours on Friday Sep 01, 2023 -- the 'Multimedia Tour of the Palace of Westminster' and the 'The State Apartments of Speaker's House' tour.
I thought that the multimedia tour was very well done and better than the multimedia tour of the Queen's Gallery Exhibition that I did on the previous Friday (25 Aug 2023). The Parliament multimedia tour had extras that you could choose to listen to (or choose not to listen to). It allowed you to choose when to press 'play'; when leaving a room with multiple exits, it showed you the artwork that you should use as your guidepost for which hallway to take. It was better structured from a communications standpoint (something that I pay particular attention to). (To contrast, the Queen's Gallery Exhibition multimedia tour at Buckingham Palace talked about a few items within rooms with many items and it didn't orient you well as to 'the next room will contain the picture of abc which is to your right when entering the next room.)
As @VAP from Virginia mentioned, you can go at your own pace for the multimedia tour and [it is] 'visiting one of those places I had only read about or seen on TV watching some Parliamentary debate.' The typical US Capitol tours no longer allow you into either chamber whereas on this tour, you do go into the House of Commons and House of Lords chambers that are shown on TV.
I very much enjoyed the State Apartments of the Speaker's House tour as this was a completely separate part of the palace and it unveiled aspects of the UK Parliament that I had no knowledge about. The particular tour guide (Kate?) was excellent in the information she conveyed (and her delivery skills).
Of the dates that you have available for London, 02 Oct is a Sunday and 03 Oct is a Monday. Availability currently exists for Monday 03 Oct for both the Multimedia Tour and the State Apartments of the Speaker's House tour.