The Original London Sightseeing Tour

Image from The Original London Sightseeing Tour website.

We woke up early Friday morning to make sure we made up for the time we lost completely jet-lagged the day before.  I wanted to ride one of those double decker bus tours to drive around London and see the city's layout.  We had great fall weather, including sunshine that eventually came through after lunch, so I was excited when we left the hotel.  The fact that the ticket booth for the bus tour was half a block away from the hotel's front door was just icing on the cake.

Mr. J and I grabbed some coffee and breakfast at one of the chain cafes and hopped on Yellow route of  The Original London Sightseeing Tour.  We started at the Piccadilly Circus stop:

T1 The Original Tour (Yellow Route)

Calling at:

Piccadilly Circus
Statue of Eros
The National Gallery
Nelson's Column
Trafalgar Square
St James's Palace
Ritz Hotel
Hyde Park
Wellington Museum
Speakers' Corner
Buckingham Palace & the Changing of the Guard
St James's Park
Westminster Abbey
Big Ben & Parliament
Lambeth Palace
The London Eye
London Aquarium
Westminster Pier
Downing Street
Horse Guards' Parade
St Martin-in-the-Fields
Covent Garden
Fleet Street
St Paul's Cathedral
Bank of England Museum
Monument
London Bridge
Southwark Cathedral
London Dungeon
HMS Belfast
Tower Bridge
The Tower of London
Shakespeare's Globe
Tate Modern
Sherlock Holmes Pub

Our view of Trafalgar Square, with the National Gallery in the background:

I want to say that this statue marks the entrance into the City of London, which is only one square mile.  It's the ancient core that was walled by Romans, according to Wiki (I am too lazy to link to a more legitimate site, sorry).  Fleet Street is the road that leads from the City to Westminster, another section of London.

A quick view of St. Paul's Cathedral, which claimed the title of London's tallest building from 1710 to 1962 (again, from Wiki).

Tower Bridge (check out that notorious London fog):

Tower of London was a pretty cool place and we actually went back later in the day to do a self-guided tour.

We wanted to check out Westminster Abbey, so we got off at the London Eye stop to take some pictures on our way to the church.

Big Ben:

Westminster Abbey had a private event the first time we went, so we came back the next day for a tour.

Our bus tour ticket included a short boat tour on the Thames.  Since one of the boat tour stops was right across the street from Big Ben, we decided to hop on and head to the tower of London for the afternoon.  See the sun starting to shine?   

I took a ton of pics from the boat tour itself, so I think that deserves its own post.  Stay tuned!