Explain the Tube for me as if I've just landed from Mars

[Littletreefrog]

I have tried googling and I am more confused than before.

2 adults and 1 1r year-old visiting London for 1 day. We would like to see some of the famous buildings i.e Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Tower of London etc.

Hop on hop off bus is many £££££ so thinking of the tube but how do we work it? How does the tap in and out thing work? Does 14 year old need own contactless debit card?

Help please

Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Tower of London

OK so come in to Waterloo and head to Waterloo Pier - take the river boat to the Tower - you'll see the Inns of Court, Tate Modern, wobbly Bridge Globe Theatre etc. Get off at Tower Bridge. After seeing the Tower (bear in mind its very expensive if you want to go inside and the queue for the Jewel House is usually long) get the District/Circle Line from Tower Hill tube to Westminster for Westminster Abbey and Houses of Parliament. From there you can walk up Great George St past the Foreign Office onto Horseguards Road. That takes you to the top of The Mall by Admiralty Arch (about a 10 minute walk from Parliament Sq) and you'll walk past the Churchill War rooms and Horseguards itself. Turn right onto the Mall past Admiralty Arch into Trafalgar Square. Then retrace your steps back past Admiralty Arch and Buckingham Palace is right in front of you half a mile down The Mall. Walk down The Mall to Buckingham Palace. (If you want an attraction then I'd recommend the Royal Mews behind the Palace where you can see state carriages/limos and horses). Green Park is to the north of The Mall and you can walk through it to Piccadilly. You then have the option of Jubilee Line from Green Park tube back to Waterloo or to turn right on Piccadilly and walk past the Ritz to Fortnum and Mason to admire the Foodhall and have an icecream sundae in the Parlour on the 1st floor. Then carry on along Piccadilly (passing the Royal Academy, BAFTA and the huge Waterstones (6 floors of books and a couple of nice places for coffee) to Piccadilly Circus tube and the Bakerloo Line back to Waterloo.

Flop exhausted on the train home.............................

You don't need to buy an oyster card any more. Each person uses a contactless card, one card for each adult, I'm not sure how old kids have to be before they travel free.

Cards work on trains tubes and buses.

Tap in for busses, tap in and out for tube and train.

Unlimited bus transfers within the hour is free.

There's a daily cap payable depending on what zone you travel through.

It may or may not be any use to you @Littletreefrog but if you’re buying Travelcards from your railway station you could potentially save a bit of money on entry fees with the 2 for 1 London scheme. I used to use it often when taking visitors into London, and it really does work!

Try the 11 bus, Op. it goes near many big tourist sights.

www.visitbritainshop.com/gb/en/articles/top-3-bus-routes

@Littletreefrog

I hadn't heard of Hans and Gretel - it looks fabulous!

https://hansandgretel.co.uk/our-stores/

@Littletreefrog

If you are at Buckingham Palace by 11 am on certain days, you will catch the Changing of the Guard.

https://www.householddivision.org.uk/changing-the-guard-calendar

Not in Zone 3 they don't, everyone does it!

I am in zone 3 and always say thank you!

Take water with you as the tube is boiling!

Always walk to the far end of the train as it will be less busy, but listen to announcements about whether the back doors are opening at your stop.

If you find you are going the wrong way just get off at the next stop and cross to the opposite platform to re-trace your journey.

All the platform entrances will have a list of stops on the wall.

Nonsense. I regularly travel on the bus zone 2 to zone 1 and back and people often shout thank you to the driver when they get off

@davros that's good to hear! My Londonder friends told me not to and that no one does and it made me really self conscious! It's part and parcel of bus rides in Edinburgh so I found it strange to be told not to! Glad to hear it's okay to do and people didn't think I was weird. (I mean, they maybe did, but at least not for saying thank you!)😁

Maybe I just have really rude friends!!

We are here with DS9 and DS7 just now and they both walked with no complaints from Big Ben/west minister > Buckingham palace. Go via st James park and stop where needed but a lot is really close

We were in London last week travelling in from Southend. DH DS (12) and I. We travelled by train and got an off peak family travel card for £47. Travel card included all buses and underground in zones 1-6. Could only get train after 9:30am and return after 7pm though.

We each got a train ticket to operate barriers at train and underground, for buses you just show the driver.

"With a little one they have wide gates so you'd go to that one with the child and tap in.

The barrier gates have a card reader, tap your bank card on it and it will open.

I would definitely do as much walking as possible though if it's a nice day, just take a pram. The tubes are stuffy and quite stressful with a LO I find."

The kid is 14 🤣🤣 mind you, doesn't have his own bank card for some reason so yeah, maybe stick him in a pram.

Definitely download Citymapper app.

I was born and raised in London and use Citymapper all the time as it shows the quickest route to get anywhere, it's brilliant.

If you're in Central London, sometimes it's actually quicker to walk rather than go on the tube to places e.g. Leicester Square to Covent Garden is a 5 minute walk through the streets, but it will take you that just to walk from street to station platform if you use the Tube.

Buses are also great, although that is largely dependent on traffic, as it can become gridlocked.

No they won't, I do this all the time!

I've read this too! Someone correct me if I'm wrong:

Use the same card for the same trip for the same person.
eg. On one journey you get debit card A, partner debit card B, teen the phone (I believe Apple Pay assigns a different dc number to cards!) and everyone stick to using their payment card.

If you tapped in with dc A, then accidentally used your phone for yourself to tap out, the TfL service will charge you max fare, it sees those as unlinked journeys.

@GoFaster83 maybe your friends are from south of the river 😆 up here it's quite usual. I don't do it personally, I say thanks when I get on, but lots of people do it

I'll say thank you to the driver on local single deckers where you get off at the front, or very quiet double deckers, but I think you'd need to yell pretty loud to be heard on a busy Zone 1 double decker where you're getting off in the middle or at the back with loads of people between you and the driver's compartment, so that's why you'll rarely hear it in Central London.

People often thank the bus driver out here in the South London suburbs, but I agree it is not common right in the centre.

I say thanks when I get on, too. South West London but I also do it if I’m in the centre.

Another idea

Take a look at the boat routes you can get on near Waterloo

www.thamesclippers.com/plan-your-journey/route-map