Just Touched Down In London Town

Three Days in London with Kids

Ah London! We had finally made it “over the pond” post-covid and it felt AMAZING! We have been waiting for this moment for three years, and London was the perfect city to explore on foot (and double decker bus, of course) while getting ourselves acclimated to traveling abroad this summer!

When the boys were five years old, and homeschooling in Kindergarten with me, we “traveled” for that year through books and videos and stories. It helped open the boys’ eyes to a world of wonder, different cultures and foods, and so many interesting sights (and sites) that they realized they wanted to visit. One destination that was high on their list from the beginning was London. I remember them drawing pictures of the London Eye, begging for Lego sets of Big Ben and Tower Bridge, and getting lost in the magical books of Harry Potter. So naturally we decided to hit all those hot spots while in London!

We arrived in London at 7 am after three jam-packed days in New York City. We ended up not sleeping a wink on our overnight flight. Total flight time was just under seven hours, so we spent our time with our eyes glued to the free movies on the plane. Time passed quickly, and next thing we knew we were descending into Gatwick Airport. Did I wish we had slept a little? Maybe. But we were high on travel adrenaline and ready for our first day in London.

My favorite part of arriving somewhere new is well, not being familiar with ANYTHING. The beauty of trying to figure out how to get from point A to point B is a challenge, and I love that for my brain. After exiting customs (where the boys excitedly told the customs agent that they were excited to visit all the London hotspots), we followed the crowd straight to the underground train station to buy our tickets north to London. The train was packed with Londoners in business suits heading to their place of work, and we stood shoulder to shoulder the whole time staring out the windows at the green, almost midwestern-looking landscape passing us by. After departing the train station, which took us extra long because we didn’t know how to get out of those auto-opening gates, we called an Uber to take us to our hotel. The first thing we noticed in London were all the electric cars, and that included the Uber that was driving us to the Marriott. Everything on the road was electric. London was feeling like a very green city from the start. Which we love!

Must. Stay. Awake. At. Canary. Wharf!

We had Marriott hotel points to burn through, so we chose to stay at their hotel along Canary Wharf (East London). We attempted to check in early, but spoiler alert: our room wasn’t ready until six hours into our time in London. They hooked us up with an incredible buffet breakfast though that reminded me why I love eating foods from different countries. And yes, we devoured our first chocolate croissant (of many!) of the trip.

Our goal for this day, especially since we didn’t have a bed anyway, was to stay fed, hydrated, and most importantly, awake until as long as possible so we could stave off any jet lag. This was our opportunity to explore the Canary Wharf area which is considered London’s central business district. We honestly hadn’t done any research on this area and I was thankful for that because we happened to discover just enough goodness to keep us awake for the next six hours. Below find us dancing in colorful subway hallways, randomly stumbling upon a beautiful rooftop garden in the middle of a city, wishing we were in a hot tub boat drinking champagne, admiring the towering buildings, and almost falling asleep in a giant lawn chair.

Around 4 pm, the Marriott finally alerted us that our room was ready. It took us approximately 3 1/2 minutes to throw our luggage down, brush our teeth, and pee then we landed face first on to our beds and fell straight to sleep. Until the hotel’s fire alarm woke us up at one in the morning. Thankfully we ended up sleeping/resting until 4 am, then twiddled our thumbs until the breakfast buffet opened at 6 am!

We found a beautiful, sunny, and warm rooftop garden - Crossrail Place Rooftop Garden

Hot tubbing….in a boat….while drinking champagne…along London’s Canary Wharf?! This sounds too good to be true. I want one.

Hyper children after staying awake for 36 hours straight. I will never forget this moment of them signing Jason Derulo’s Savage Love down this colorful corridor.

Harry Potter World

High on our list of things to see while in London was a visit to the Warner Bros Studio for ‘The Making of Harry Potter’ tour. We had only read a handful of the books, and watched a few of the movies but our whole family was thoroughly excited. The tour began by opening its grand doors to the Great Hall where we were immediately transported into the world and set of the Harry Potter films with suspended candles, the long wooden tables, and music from the HP soundtrack. We wandered about the different sets reliving parts we witnessed in the movies. Favorites (though there were so many) was seeing and touring Hogwarts Express, walking through the Forbidden Forest, pulling up the screaming madrakes, and driving the ‘Flying Ford’ car from the Chamber of Secrets movie. It was so much fun to learn how things were made and used in the movies, and to see everything in real life. It was an absolutely magical day, that ended with riding in a double decker bus back towards London (another bucket list activity the boys wanted to check off). Pro tip: Get the earliest tickets possible for the tour! We ended up being the first group through the sets that day and there was hardly anyone around (even during July’s high season).

The magic potion room

Screaming mandrakes!

Tower Bridge

We began to realize after New York that the boys sure are amazing tourists. We weren’t exactly sure how they would do in these big cities. Most of our vacations are to beach destinations where we spend a lot of time in the ocean versus sightseeing in large cities. So it was pretty impressive to see that they could hang with us adults when it came to walking around big cities. The day we toured London was a full day on our feet (save for the Uber boat ride along the Thames!).

First stop after getting dropped off by yet another “green” uber was to see the famous Tower Bridge and Tower of London. We had seen iconic spots in photos, books and lego sets so many times but to witness it in person was unreal. It felt like the quintessential London scene: small European cars and red double-decker buses cruising across Tower Bridge and over the River Thames.

Me and my jibs in front of Tower Bridge, London

Dad and Reid walking across the iconic Tower Bridge!

Big Ben, London Eye, & An Uber Boat!

Look at us! We were still going strong and it was early afternoon in London. We fueled up on street hot dogs and ice cream, then made our way to another section of London that had all the other recognizable sights we wanted to see!

While we were planning for our trip months back, we had sort of made the decision that we weren’t going to get tickets to ride the London Eye. I’m not really sure what our reasoning was. But the moment we saw it emerge from behind Big Ben, Bennett and I were determined to find a way on. We hustled past the street performers, across the Westminster Bridge, and into the London Eye ticket booth. Sadly, at first glace there was nothing available until two days later. I hit the back button and magically an opening appeared for 2:15 pm that day. I double check the time and it was 2 pm. We quickly snatched the two remaining tickets that were available, paid, and made our way to the line. We were PUMPED! The lines were short and we were corralled into one of the ferris wheel pods within five minutes. I’m a sucker for views and spontaneous memories so this was the perfect moment to spend with Bennett.