What’s a must for a teenagers first trip to London if?

[EineReiseDurchDieZeit]

English isn’t first language so a show wouldn’t work

One likes Football and the other Music

Group will have a 7 year old in it as well

I don’t really see London as about football and music. Both difficult to deal with as they are not centrally available. We always viewed London as having the best things to see if you plan. DC always liked the Tower of London and we get the Thames cruise back to Westminster. You see a lot on the way back, and then you have Big Ben, Westminster Abbey or the walk up to Trafalgar Square if you prefer. Add in the Tower Bridge experience as well if you have time. Plus you could go over Westminster Bridge and go on the Eye.

Another successful day is St Paul’s, then cross the river via the Millennium bridge and walk along the South Bank. The Globe is worth a stop.

There’s always the Science and/or Natural history museum at Kensington. Both get busy though but for good reason.

I’m fairly sure Tottenham do stadium tours and the station at Tottenham is accessed from Liverpool Street via the Weaver line. The stadium is very close to the station.

But you hop on the tube and you’ll be at a lot of stadiums in no time.

I would opt for general sightseeing, take the uber boat to Greenwich and visit the maritime museum, go to South Kensington for the science and natural history museums. All those museums are free. For a treat Hamley’s will be popular with all ages. The London eye isn’t cheap but if budget allows it works for all ages.

https://boroughmarket.org.uk/ - with added bonus that just around the corner is the filming location for Lock Stock and 2 Smoking Barrels. https://movie-locations.com/movies/l/Lock-Stock-And-Two-Smoking-Barrels.php

But wherever in the country they live will also have lovely parks! They are coming to London to do London things. And the city is filled with wonderful museums and galleries that are not “tourist traps”.

My kids love history so my top tips would be:
1 Tower of London then walk over London Bridge and along the South Bank. Could also visit the Belfast if they would be interested in an old navel ship.
2 British Museum - especially the mummies and other Egyptian artefacts, and the Sutton Hoo horde.
3 V&A, Science and Natural History Museums are all in a row together and all free. I think the V&A may have a collection of old musical instruments.
4 If they are even remotely into Lego, then the Lego Store at Leicester Square is a must.
5 Transport Museum is good but mainly for people who are really into transport (or quite little kids).
6 Imperial War Museum or the Churchill War Rooms if they are interested military history (IWM owns both and the Belfast so if you are going to do more than one, buy membership and it will be cheaper).

For almost all of the above, you will get in much more quickly if you pre-book tickets, even the free attractions.

So much to think about here

Trying to minimise Tube use

The bus tour would be a good idea.

West Ham’s ground being in Olympic park is a good one to visit, as there is plenty for the others to do in the area.
Riverboat trip to Greenwich is always good or on to the o2 and do the cable car.
Agree with others sky garden over London eye, there are other free tall buildings now that are not as good but have the views if you can’t get skygarden tickets.
Changing of the guard is good for the music and Covent Garden for the buskers

You can go to the lower level just for a coffee or for the breakfast in the resteraunt above, mine really enjoyed it.

sky garden in the Walkie Talkie building

@jay55 I’m not sure West Ham would be on his radar, more likely Champions League type teams but the Olympic Park is an interesting idea

@SummerInSun Thanks for all your suggestions! Some great stuff here. I’m not a massive fan of the British Museum but I can see it would interest them

Second people suggesting some of the free places and booking in advance for them.

Whatever you like, even if it's football or music, London has some of the best museums in the world - I'd break these up and not do all of them in one day. Permanent exhibitions are free to all of these but who knows how long for. I reckon in the next year or two that will change.

1. Natural History Museum. Beware of the queues but ideal for all ages.
2. Science Museum. I'm a scientist and this museum absolutely boils my piss how much they do not make science exciting in ways it would be SO EASY to do, especially since they got rid of the brilliant "engineering your future" part but that said, if you've not been before, it's worth an hour. My teen son was not impressed by the gaming bit so beware that IMO the cost of that isn't worth the money.
3. British Museum. Beware that ooh historical stuff isn't as exciting to many 7 year olds as adults (which is one of the problems with the science museum) and this place is HUGE. DO NOT TRY TO SEE IT ALL! If your teens and 7 year old have done some specific topic at school recently though it would be possible to split up and regroup somewhere later. For example, when my son was doing a big section on Egypt in primary school that's the only section we went to that day.
4. Some of the art places might be more interesting to the teens but from memory the V&A had some coffee places in the central courtyard last time I went so you could always leave the teens to look while you have some downtime with the 7 year old. Other art galleries include National Gallery, Portrait Gallery and Tate Britain (my favourite of the more traditional ones.)
5. Tate Modern is surprisingly fun with kids. Just because there's always something odd. Teens will get something out of it too IMO. Also you're about 15 minute walk from the Southbank Centre food market (street food) which is worth going to. Give the teens some cash to buy their own from one of the HUGE number of stalls and meet up afterwards. Only if it's not raining obviously but London is a surprisingly dry city.

Specific ideas for football and music

1. Wembley tour. My son went once with school and loved it even though he hates football. Also consider lots of bands have played there. I've not been so can't vouch for it but my son is a picky sod.
2. Tour of one of the major football grounds but as football is tribal, it might be best to check which one.
3. Campden market has some music history but is HUGE.

I definitely want to go to Borough myself @youandyourelk I hope we can fit it in

I can’t reply to everyone individually right now but thanks for so many replies and great suggestions

I was really ranking the Science Museum @Lemonthyme I’ve never been and I know their Dad would be interested - is it really a bit shit if you’ve never been ?

@EineReiseDurchDieZeit Where are you staying? The Olympic park is a long way from the Science museum! My dc liked the science museum but maybe we had low expectations!

@MeetMeOnTheCorner

Nothing is booked yet so I imagine we’ll get a hotel in the midst of where we want to go.

If you like science history, it's amazing.

If you like simple hands on stuff it's good but not great.

The Berlin science & technology museum is the best one we've been to by a long way. I think the Science Museum suffers from not being as hands on as it could be (and that IMO is what science is all about). They have put in stuff more recently which is ok but a lot is very screen based from memory. I last went maybe 18 months ago so I'm not sure if they've put in any new things.

@Lemonthyme there’s a science museum locally to them so I would hate for ours to be inferior