Last post I gave you some starting tips on planning. I'm mean the very, very basics. Boring, I know, but I felt like it needed to be done. The reason I did that post was for one very important reason...we found things to do that our local travel agency didn't even know about! Originally we went into a local agency thinking that the whole planning process was going to be too stressful. So we trekked into Travel Le...ahem...a travel agency (That, for their own sake, won't be named due to the horrible experience we had with them on multiple occasions.) and asked for help with planning our trip off of the list of attractions we had come up with. The guy didn't know about many things on our list! AND, he claimed to have planned multiple trips to London and England for people.
Okay, I'm going to jump off my Google soapbox and get down to the fun stuff! I found so many websites on London attractions while researching what we wanted to do, but it took a lot of time. I mean, believe me, I was more than willing to put in the time, but after a while it got a bit daunting! I would scour the internet at work, at home, and even woke up at 3 AM on the weekend because I just knew that there had to be another website with more information. So...rather than putting you all through the same wretched process here is my Top 5 websites & apps for planning your London Trip.
This website seriously kicks arse! Although I knew a lot of the main attractions we wanted to see (i.e. Big Bed, Westminster, Buckingham Palace), I didn't enjoy spending the time finding the official website for each spot to find opening times, location & cost. If you find an attraction on the Visit London site it automatically has the name as a link you can click on for more information and within that, a link to the official website. ON TOP OF THAT, it also has multiple other functions like hotel information, itineraries, information on international travel, and tons of discounts in a 'Special Offers' section. Who doesn't love a good deal? They do have an app however it's called "Official London."
If you want to hit the main 'touristy' things in London (as we did), you need to buy this pass. The pass gets you into over 60 attractions around London for FREE, and there are hundreds of pounds more in discounts at restaurants, attractions & stores. You can buy the passes in 1,2,3 & 6 day passes and it also has the option of the 'travel' card as well. This gives you access to the London underground, overground, and rail system with unlimited journeys for however many days you add. It can seem a bit spendy at first, but I guarantee our 6 day passes with travel was paid for just in how much we used the tube alone. FYI, they do have an app for this site.
This one may seem obvious for many people but it helped a lot when we were looking to book with certain tour guide agencies since sometimes the agencies website reviews are a little skewed in my opinion. Again, like visitlondon, they have a ton of deals on hotels and restaurants but really use it for the reviews. I also liked checking out the travel forums so I could see other questions people were asking about their trips. Let me tell you, I got a ton of answers to questions I didn't even know I had until someone else asked it. Again, app available.
I thought I would just use this app one we were over there but by the second day we really had the whole system down. I actually used it much more before hand as you can type in your starting and ending point and it will give you multiple ways of getting from Point A to Point B. From quickest, to least stairs, to the least amount of line changes, it really makes getting around London much lest stressful. It helped me so much when planning for how long I needed to allot for travel time between attractions. The link above isn't to the app but just search "tube map" in your app market at it will come up. The symbol looks like the picture to the right. The link will, however, take you to the official transport website for London, which is very useful as well.
Another great website for researching attractions and hotels but I loved all the practical travel tips it had on the best ATMs to use, how to tip, average costs of eating out, and tons of information on other travel and transportation options. Nothing overly special, but definitely informative and full of great information.
P.S. Their travel books are amazing! Check them out here http://shop.lonelyplanet.com/ for guidebooks, phrasebooks for other languages, and even books on activities like Trekking and Cycling!
I hope this information helps you all with your planning needs. And a quick note, Tripadvisor and Lonely Planet will work on any vacation planning, so keep these in your back pocket for plenty of other trips down the road. And remember...
The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.
Mike & Alicia
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