Hello! We did the Best of Italy in 17 tour and decided to spend 4 days revisiting London on our way home! Here is the day-by-day report of our 4 days in London.
10/12
We took an early flight out of Rome to London, leaving the hotel at 4:30 am, so we decided hire a taxi to take us. The flight to London was short and we found the express train from Heathrow to London easily, arriving around 11. We stayed at the Sanctuary House Hotel, which was a cute little inn above a pub in the Westminster area. It was pretty pricy for us, but we really wanted something small and centrally located, so we are glad we chose it. Our room wasn't ready yet, so we dropped our baggage and did a little walk about. It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon, so we wandered through St. James Park to look at the flowers and birds. There was something going on with the horses at the Horse Guards building across the street, so we watched there for a bit. Then we found a little place to eat near the Thames. Believe it or not, we wanted something other than Italian after 19 wonderful days in Italy! So we had tacos at a Mexican restaurant. We never saw the National Gallery on our first trip, so we decided to see as much as we could of it on this one. We took a map and started checking off rooms, planning to visit for a bit each day, but we grew discouraged because we didn't really know what we were looking for, so we decided to come back the next day with a better plan. By this time our room was ready, so we walked back to rest a bit. We snagged half priced tickets to see Mamma Mia, so we went out for a quick dinner at a local chain that specializes in grilled chicken, although the name escapes me now. It was good and quick and cheap. We loved Mamma Mia, and enjoyed a walk back to our hotel from there.
10/13
We were so tired from our travels that we decided to sleep in a bit today. We grabbed a quick pastry at Pret A Manger next to our hotel and then walked to the Trafalgar area to see if we could get discounted tickets for anything for that evening, and were able to get great seats for Kinky Boots. We spent some more time in the National Gallery, this time with Rick’s walking tour, which made for a much more organized and fulfilling visit. Then we decided to grab lunch at a fast-food Indian place before walking along the Thames to see the Tower Bridge and visit the Tower of London. I do not recommend this walk - it is much further than we thought and not as interesting as we expected. I don’t think we enjoyed the Tower as much as we would have had we not been so tired from all the walking we had been doing, so we decided we needed to step up our use of the Underground. We had not seen the Tower of London on our last trip to London, and I loved it, especially the Crown Jewels. They are just incredible, and I really liked that they had a conveyer belt for visitors to stand on so everyone can get an unobstructed view but people can’t crowd around. It made for a very pleasant, non-rushed viewing. We ran out of time so we had a quick bite to eat at Pret A Manger and headed out to see Kinky Boots, which is easily one of the best shows I’ve seen. So much fun! And such a great cast! I highly recommend seeing theater productions while in London - we found it much cheaper than the same shows in our area when purchased at a discount, and the theaters are much smaller than the one in my hometown, so we were able to sit closer than we ever have.