Advice for visiting London, from a fellow tourist

London is one of those classic go-to destinations, both when planning small weekend getaways as well as big trips. Also, it is one of those wild card destinations of which you can be pretty sure that you haven't made a mistake choosing, because everyone loves it there. Or at least the city interests them.

In any case, it is one of the biggest metropolitan cities in Europe, with more than 8 million habitants all over the city. This is why travelling to London without a minimal level of preparation can result in a very chaotic and overwhelming trip. Except for if you come from New York, London is going to seem enormous to you and completely full with people wherever you go.

My experience in London was for four days during July, so well into high-season, and was the middle ground between a long trip and a short getaway. From these days, as well as falling in love at first sight with England, helped me realise the right way to be a tourist in a city and so I could figure out what life in the "City" should be like.

I have to admit that this was a trip that I had really wanted to do for a very long time for several reasons. Amongst those reasons was the music, London is a place where many of the greatest bands and music personalities from popular music have been born, so that practically wherever you go, you can find some music references. Also, the English language has always really interested me more than the others, as well as the general British way of life.

During this post, I am going to do a run-through of the things which I think are the most important for tourists to keep in mind, while I try and give advice according to my experience as a tourist. I don't want to do a step-by-step post of everything that I did in London, because I believe that London is a city which is better to describe in a more individual and personal way. Partly due to its big size and the number of things that there are to see, and partly because of the huge number of possibilities it has to offer.

Flights and accommodation

The first thing to bear in mind when travelling to Great Britain is the flights. While it is true that it is possible to travel to the Island without having to fly, going by plane is probably the most convenient way to get to your destination. You can get the tickets at a really good price depending on how far advance you buy them or the dates you are looking for, but it shouldn't be difficult to buy return tickets for around 100 euros from one of the low-cost airlines, that offer direct flights to the well known London Heathrow airport.

Ryanair or Vueling are two companies that I am certain offer flights to London regardless of the date that you are planning the trip. But, of course, they are companies that are generally less comfortable than the more expensive airlines and also have more problems, and less cover for these in the case that they do occur.

Depending on what the traveller is looking for, it is also possible to find flights at a higher price with better-quality airlines, but seeing as we are speaking for young travellers without a great deal of income, this isn't the best option.

When booking accommodation, if you are going with friends, the best way is to find one of the many youth hostels with shared bedrooms which are all over the city. These often have a really good deal, especially in rooms with a big number of beds to share. But the best option if you are travelling as a couple, like I did, is to reserve a room in an apartment-hotel, which offers an air-conditioned room with a bed, TV, and a small kitchen which you are free to use. The best thing about this option is that you have complete freedom and comfort. Despite it not being the cheapest option, it is definitely much cheaper than a hotel room, where even those at the lowest price do not offer the same commodities.

In my case, I had reserved one of these rooms using Booking.com, and I had a perfect experience. It was completely equipped, situated in a good area of the city (near to Camden Town) and with a reception where they gave us all of the commodities from the start, from the method of paying to leaving your suitcases there on the last day so you don't have to drag them around the city before going to the airport to go back home. Also, the building and the street in which we found ourselves was a lovely area, not at all unsafe like some reviews said that we had read about the area.

Options like reserving a flat with Wimdu don't seem to be the best idea in London, for as I saw myself, most of the flats that they offered were shared rooms and not at a very affordable price compared to what other European cities offer.

What to see and how to get around

London is one of the biggest cities in Europe and with the greatest amount of thing to do, as well as a varied cultural offering as well. The first thing that one should think when looking at the map of London is the staggering distance between the different city monuments, not forgetting that at the end of the day you will have to go back to the area where you are staying. It can be exhausting if you haven't organised your plan for each day very well.

While the best way to get to know a city is to go around it by foot most of the time, London is somewhere that makes this pretty impossible to do. You have to be careful not to underestimate the distances, especially those who come from Madrid as we are used to everything being a "20-minute walk" away. It isn't the same thing in London. And although walking for a long time isn't going to kill you, it can be an ordeal depending on which part of the city you are in.

Therefore, I think that the best way to get around London is by bus. As well as being one of the biggest symbols of the city, at the same time, you can go on one of the tourist buses travelling on the top deck, letting you see corners of the city which would have been impossible to discover by foot if you are only in London for a short time. The London bus network is very complete and efficient, and nowadays with the GPS that everyone has on their phone, it is almost impossible to miss or go past the stop.

The other option to get around cheaply and efficiently is to use the London Underground, although the cheapness of this depends on what kind of ticket you buy, as a single journey ticket is over 4 euros. In any case, it's good to bear in mind that for 12 euros you can buy a subscription (a travel card) that lets you use whatever form of London public transport you like in the metropolitan zone for the whole day. With metro, trams and buses, everything is included with this ticket, something which unfortunately I only discovered later.

In terms of the underground, the stand out feature is the frequency that the mainline trains to the city come, with trains every 1 or 2 minutes. Inside they don't seem very safe, but for the number of people living in the city the state of them is more than acceptable.

How to use these methods of public transport depends on what your individual interests are or the activity that you are going to do in London. If for example, you are very interested in London's range of museums, it may work out to dedicate a whole day to seeing them all; as as well as having a lot of them, they are very big, with ones like the British Museum being basically impossible to do in just one visit.

That is why museums should be done in a relaxed fashion, as despite offering free entry to citizens of the European Union, nobody likes running around a museum full of people without getting to see anything properly but seeing everything at once. If you don't want to see any particular museum but they do interest you, the best ones are the British Museum and the National Gallery.

Monuments are practically everywhere in the city, and lots of them are located very far apart, so it often works out to take advantage and see the things which are nearby the main site that you want to visit.

For example, if you go to visit Big Ben and Westminster Abbey, it works out afterwards to go towards Buckingham Palace by going through the Saint James Park to subsequently spend the evening in Hyde Park if the weather is in your favour, where you can also take the opportunity to visit the Royal Albert Hall, and the Museum of Natural History of London, then end the day going into the department store Harrods to buy souvenirs. There are so many possibilities, the only thing that I'd say would be to avoid long journeys, only doing these if you really have to.

I'd also highly recommend walks through Soho and Chinatown, which are very nearby the big tourist areas such as the National Gallery or Piccadilly Circus, an area which offers a big number of shows and shops, for example the biggest toy shop in the world.

More ideas for possible trips through London would be to visit Camden Town Market in the morning, and then take public transport towards Tower Bridge (which is quite far away) to then visit the other famous spots of the city such as Waterloo Bridge, which I have talked about in a past blog about how much I enjoyed visiting it. On the same side there is Waterloo Station which is also famous, and the well-known London Eye, which without a doubt is the best viewpoint in London. Saying this, the entrance isn't cheap and depending on the dates, the queue to enter can be quite long.

There are hundreds of routes, it all depends on who you are here with, how long you are staying in the city and how much you want to see and which corners of the city you can imagine yourself getting lost in. There are infinite combinations and it depends on all of these factors, but one that occurred to me which I put in practice during my visit to London as a tourist, was to visit the places which had become a significant pop music symbol in history, for example, the Abbey Road zebra crossing, which gained fame through the famous album by the Beatles. I talked about some of these places in my post about Music in London.

Food and weather

It is a well-known fact that the weather in London is "bad". Fog in the winter, the overcast sky in the summer and rain all year long. In any case, except for when there is particularly bad weather, this doesn't usually stop you from visiting the city normally. During my visit, which took place in the middle of July, I enjoyed two days with quite a lot of sun and the other two days which were foggier and with a bit of rain. Therefore, it is important that you don't forget to bring an umbrella, for as well as raining frequently, it is often intermittent during the day. Although if you do forget to bring one, in any shop on the street you can buy a typical London umbrella, as I did.

It is clear that when you travel to London no one is expecting good weather, therefore you shouldn't be surprised at not seeing a single sunny day in the city during your stay there. If this occurs, the best thing to do to overcome this is to visit some of the colourful pubs that are on every corner of the city. These are places where you can enjoy the most traditional English food and try their typical draught beers. You can usually eat quite well in these places. They are an unmissable stop for any tourist.

The other options to eat in London are the fast food places or restaurants with cuisine from any country. They have lots of Asian restaurants, especially in Soho. They are the best option for eating out.

The final option, and certainly not the least important one, is to buy your own food at a supermarket (which close considerably earlier than the Spanish ones). As often in youth hostels as in the apartment room that I stayed in, they'll have a kitchen in which you can prepare ingredients or heat up fast food. This is without a doubt the cheapest option in this location, and sometimes, the most convenient.

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