We had a marvelous time traversing the United Kingdom with our children, ages 22, 19, and 7. Everywhere we went, we found something to delight everybody. We spent 13 days, and pulled our suitcases (or scootered our suitcase, as the case may be) through London, Bath, York, and Edinburgh. We saw a number of little towns in between. I will cover what we saw and did in each city in separate posts, so I can do them all justice. England with kids was a joy. Its always nice to travel in a country where you understand the language. But the people are genuinely friendly and kind.
We had just wrapped up a year of medieval history in our homeschool. There is much English history involved, so it was a perfect ending. The late May, early June weather suited us perfectly. A sweater or hoodie and light rain jacket were all that was needed, and that was more for Scotland than for London, which was quite warm (especially in the Tube).
London is quite an expensive place to stay, eat, and shop. The exchange rate, dollar to pound, added about 30% to whatever number we saw on the price tag. Since there were five of us, we chose AirBnB’s rather than hotels. We stayed just outside of Notting Hill. We chose it for its nearness to an Underground station.
It is a fairly simple thing to navigate London by subway and double decker bus. They both use a tap to pay credit card system. Small children are free. Simply tap in the handicapped lane in the Underground and move the child through the automatic gates with you. You can move them through the regular gates, but when my kiddo hesitated once, I got a solid smack on the hip from the closing gate. It was painful.
We flew Norse Air from Miami. To avoid parking at Miami airport (since we live 30 or so miles from it), we took the Tri-Rail to and from the airport. The Tri-Rail conveniently slides right into the airport. However, the weekend trains are sparse, so keep that in mind if returning on a sleepy Sunday!
Norse is like the Spirit Airlines of travel to England. Nothing at all is offered to you free – not even water on a nine hour flight. The hired third party counter crew in Miami Airport is downright nasty. They could care less if you get on a flight or not. They seated all 5 of us separately, not a single pair of seats together. And to punish us for not paying extra for assigned seating, though the 4 of us adults were seated within 6 rows of each other, they seated my seven year old 19 rows in front of us, completely alone. When asked if something could be done, the gate agent stated that they will sell me an entirely new seat, otherwise it was not their problem. It was a completely full flight, so I am not sure how that would have worked. The flight crew was a nicer group of humans, thankfully.
We brought snacks from home for the flight there. London Gatwick Airport has a small grocery store, perfect for picking up sandwiches and drinks for the flight home. Nine hours is a long time and we still ended up buying some in-flight drinks. I also had great success, both coming and going, with a homeopathic for jet lag called Jet Zone.
Some of the agents were very fussy about luggage size. We went with one checked bag for the group and a carry-on for each of us (plus our personal item). We didn’t need much heavy clothing in early summer and wanted to bring home lots of souvenirs from England, so this was a good arrangement.
We arrived in London Gatwick Airport very early in the morning. We took a very expensive, nearly two hour cab ride to where we were staying. Now that we know our way around London, we would do as we did on the way back to the airport and take the Gatwick Express. As far as airports in England go, we heard Gatwick was a more pleasant destination than Heathrow.
Once we deposited our luggage and freshened up, we headed right out to the Victoria and Albert Museum. It is free. Gotta love that, because England, especially London, is a pricey place! We didn’t know much about the museum, so we opted to take a tour that covered some of the museum’s highlights.
The building itself is lovely. We could have spent much longer in there, but we had a lot on our itinerary. My seven year was enamored with a giant bed on display from 1590, that was considered very luxurious for its time. It was gaudy, had ropes for bedsprings. and held up to four couples. That amused all of us. I enjoyed some really lovely sculptures there. We had good coffee and sandwiches in the courtyard. Sandwiches in England are confusing. They seem to be ham or cheese. They haven’t yet thought of putting them together, I guess.
We had heard marvelous things about the Princess Diana Memorial Playground. Imagine the crushing disappointment of a seven year old to find it was closed that day for maintenance. I don’t know that there was any way we could have known that. We could glimpse a giant pirate ship and other whimsical climbing structures within. It looked like a good time and we had walked a long way to get there, but it was not to be.
I read and heard from a number of people that the inside of Kensington Palace was not that impressive for the money. Instead, we enjoyed walking through the gardens, collecting a few swan feathers, imagining we were young Princess Victoria growing up lonely and sad there. We took pictures, walked down Embassy Row, identifying all of the flags, and had matcha at a local spot.
St. Paul’s Cathedral is absolutely magnificent. And we only saw the outside. It was another spot we opted not to pay admission to go into. We enjoyed the small garden there, felt tiny on those massive steps, and re-enacted the “Feed the Birds” scene from Mary Poppins. Then it was time for supper.
We headed to Ye Old Cheshire Cheese Pub. It’s the real deal – an authentic, very old pub, frequented by Charles Dickens and G. K. Chesterton. The atmosphere is perfect. I felt like writing a novel there. Be sure to check out their original copy of A Tale of Two Cities for a fun literary surprise!
The wooden seats have worn spots and everything sort of tilts to the middle of the room, just because it is so old and worn. We loved it! We had the Cheshire cheeseboard for starters. Every cheese was delicious and hearty. Between us we tried steak and kidney suet pudding, the sausage ring, bubble and squeak, and sticky toffee pudding. It was very British and great fun! There are a number of rooms to peek in. It is a bit meandering and ramshackle, which just adds to the fun. It just felt like England, being in there.
We booked a Paddington afternoon tea tour on a retro red double decker bus, something that just seems like it must be done when in England, for the afternoon. After sleeping a little bit late due to the time adjustment, five hours difference from Eastern Standard, we had just enough time to do a music fan touristy must-do.
We headed over for a quick visit to the iconic music studio where the Beatles recorded so much musical magic. It was surprising how close their famous Abbey Road cover photo shoot took place. They literally walked to the nearest cross walk and SNAP! The most famous album cover in history in born. So we dutifully re-enacted the album cover. There is lots of traffic in the area and we tried not to be disruptive as we sheepishly strode across the street, three or four times. But how could we be in London and not?
This was the event my seven year old most looked forward to – The Paddington Afternoon Tea London Tour. Originally scheduled for noon, we were rescheduled for 3 p.m. Note: the tours do not leave from Brigit’s Bakery, but rather a few blocks away. Brigit’s Bakery has a number of tours to choose from. Big fans of the Paddington Bear stories, we chose this tour with our kiddo in mind. We had the bottom floor of the red, double decker bus to ourselves, with our own, attentive waiter.
There were a number of savory sandwiches served first. My favorite was the smoked salmon on the pretzel bun. There were plenty of marmalade sandwiches! The sweets trays were delicious with a macaron, lemon meringue tart, cupcake, cookie, and a pudding. The tea selection was good, and the lidded Paddington cup goes with you as a souvenir. The tour ends with jam, clotted cream, and fluffy scones. We left stuffed and fairly well informed about London landmarks.
The tour is a mix of an entertaining tour guide and recordings on a small screen at each table with narration by Paddington. It hits some major London landmarks, most of which we saw on foot, later in the trip. The bus itself is adorable. It was lots of fun.
We did not have time for Windsor Palace. I had read that it was the one palace worth seeing the inside of. But since it is out of way and a little hard to get to, and it needs half a day to enjoy, we never made it. Instead we discovered something fun. Wednesdays have cheap West End shows! Prices were shockingly cheaper than what we spend in New York – even from the TIX booth. Our adult daughters went to see The Play That Goes Wrong and thoroughly enjoyed it. Seeing it in England, full of that British humor, was a treat.
My husband and I took our youngest daughter to see Matilda. It is a fun and colorful show, perfect for kids (if you don’t mind glorified naughtiness). The theaters were two blocks from each other and we met right after for delicious bao buns and amazing oolong at Molly Tea in neighboring Chinatown.
Stay tuned for the next leg of the trip! More London!
