Being such a popular city, it can be difficult to arrange what to do for a full day, for the simple fact that there are so many different sights and attractions to take in.
Without taking into account the specific interests of different people, the following schedule is considered to be a great way to spend a full day London break, encompassing a taste of a variety of popular attractions.

Waking early, a stroll around Hyde Park is always strongly recommended. One of the largest parks in London, Hyde Park covers over 350 acres of land (around half of the size of Central Park in New York) and a range of different attractions in itself. From the Holocaust Memorial to the rose garden and plenty of beautiful lakes, an early morning walk through Hyde Park is a perfect way to start the day.

Leaving Hyde Park in the south east corner, you can walk east along Constitution Hill and within a matter of minutes end up at the official residence of the Queen of the United Kingdom, Buckingham Palace.

A beautiful and breathtaking building, part of the palace is open to the public and with the knowledge of a tour guide, you can view the inside of Buckingham Palace and receive information on this wonderful property.

Walking up the Mall and turning north at Trafalgar Square until you are at Piccadilly Circus, jump on the tube here at head to Covent Garden for a late breakfast in one of the many cafes, bistros or restaurants that are available.

After eating, you can take in the nearby sights, including the indoor market and street acts, before taking the tube to either South Kensington or Gloucester Road, both of which are only a small walk away from the National History Museum.

If you are planning to spend time in the National History Museum, it is highly recommended not to plan anything else for the rest of the day, as there are so many different exhibits that several days can be taken up exploring them all.

After finishing at the National History Museum, it is recommended to head back to your hotel and freshen up, before getting a black cab to Leicester Square for an early meal.

If you’re planning on moving house to London, then you’ll find that property prices vary significantly from one part of London to another and you if you’re moving to London for work, you may consider instead buying or renting somewhere in one of the surrounding counties Essex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Surrey or Kent (starting to the North East of London and finishing South East of London).

Here, property prices will be significantly cheaper and you’ll be able to commute to work for 1,000 – 2,500 or so a year, depending on your location.

For removals to London, parking is often an issue, so we recommend obtaining a parking permit for your removal van and perhaps planning your house or office move for a relatively quiet time of day. If you’re moving to London from elsewhere, it may be best to use a London van man or removal company who knows their way around London, or if not choose a van man who has a satellite navigation system, to ensure you don’t spend hours drive round London trying to locate your new house.

Choosing which area of London to move to

Many people say that when you relocate to London, you will always be a Northerner or a Southerner, depending on which side of the Thames you are on.

North London has more tube stations and public transport and has always been considered more up-market. The majority of London’s business and corporate world is based North of the river, so when you’re in North London, there is a feeling of industry.

North London includes Archway, Hampstead and Highgate, which have more of a small town atmosphere, with several large parks and a good selection of pubs and restaurants.

North West London includes Camden, Kilburn, Notting Hill, Willesden Green and Wembley, where there is an active night life with busy markets and up market restaurants and bars. The most popular markets include Camden and Portobello Road.

West London (but still North of the river) includes Acton, Hammersmith and Shepherds Bush, where a large number of Aussies and Kiwis have relocated. The houses in West London are more affordable than the rest of North London.

The history of South London is that it used to be outside of the city walls, so it was once a rural location. As a result of this, South London has more parks and greenery. You’re also closer to Brighton and the seaside.

In South London you find Battersea, Brixton, Clapham and Wandsworth, where many old factories have been replaced by modern apartments. Battersea is home to the Dogs and Cats home, the New Covent Garden Market and Battersea park, containing 83 hectares of greenery. While the whole of the London underground is crowded and busy, Clapham Junction is the busiest station in the whole of Europe, with trains transporting people to a wide range of destinations.

South West London is the location of Earls Court, Fulham, Putney, Wimbledon and Southfields. Earls Court in Kensington and Chelsea has a thriving social atmosphere and is home to the Earls Court Exhibition Centre, one of the country’s largest indoor arenas and a popular concert venue.

The area of London best known for its industry is perhaps the South East, with Canary Wharf, the Docklands being home to numerous businesses and huge office blocks for banks and other major industries. The relatively new Docklands Light Rail is fairly prices and offers a quick route to the center of London from the South East. Canary Wharf and the Docklands are comprised primarily of commercial enterprises, so for more of a social and historical atmosphere, wed recommend Greenwich instead.

The boom in car ownership occurred in the 1950s and 60s. Car ownership in London quadrupled between 1950 and 1970 as standards of living rose and car prices fell. By the mid-1960s, there were 1.5 million cars registered in London and the numbers continued to rise until the end of the century when 2.2 million cars were registered at London addresses.

Increasing car ownership meant increasing traffic congestion. By the 1960s, London’s traffic problem was considered to affect only the evening and morning rush hours in central London. It was not until the 1980s that congestion came to be a problem across London at more or less all hours of the day. This culminated in 2003 with the introduction of the controversial London congestion charge, a fee for motorists traveling within those parts of London designated as the Congestion Charge Zone (CCZ). The main objectives of this charge were to reduce congestion, and to raise funds for investment in London’s transport system.

Nowadays, with the rising cost of oil resulting in higher petrol and diesel prices, the cost of owning a car in London is higher than ever. According to the AA, the average cost of a litre of unleaded petrol was 104.2p at the end of 2007; a litre of diesel would have set you back 109.2p.

But the rising price of fuel is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the cost of motoring. According to Sainsbury’s Bank, the average cost of running a car, excluding petrol, is now just over £1,000 a year. And if you have borrowed money to buy your vehicle, as most car owners have, the costs are even higher.

The astronomical expense of motoring has encouraged many people to reconsider whether they need to own a car at all. If you live in a city and only have the occasional need for a set of wheels, it could work out considerably cheaper to ditch your vehicle and instead consider car hire. Rental vehicle companies and city car clubs provide a service that allows you to hire cars near your home for anywhere between half an hour and a month at a time, with the end result is that for a fraction of the cost of running your own car, you could enjoy similar access to a set of wheel whenever you need them.

So if you’re looking for an inexpensive place to live in London, a studio apartment is probably your best bet. They’re located all around the city, and most times they’re furnished, which is definitely helpful if you’re trying to conserve cash.

How do you find one? Follow these steps:

Step 1
Decide what area you’d like to be in. London is divided in 32 neighborhoods called boroughs, in addition to the City of London. Several boroughs are often clumped together and referred to as the South, South West, West, South East, North and North West.

If you’re on a budget, the South (Brixton, Battersea, Clapham and Wandsworth) and the South West (Earl’s Court, Fulham, Putney, Southfields and Wimbledon) tend to have more reasonably priced accommodations.

Though if money isn’t a problem, you’ll want to try the North (Archway, Hampstead or Highgate) and the North West (Camden, Kilburn, Notting Hill, Wembly or Willesden Green).

Greater London is around 675 square miles, so if you’ll be going to work or school, be sure to consider your transportation options.

Step 2
Check Craigslist London. Once you decide on an area you’ll be able to search through Craigslist London for apartments in your desired borough.

Step 3
If you’re in a rush, post a request in the Craigslist All Housing Wanted section. Be sure to include your price range (in pounds, of course), the desired borough, and whether you’re looking for furnished or unfurnished accommodations.

Step 4
If you’d prefer to work through an agency, do a search on FindAProperty.com. Many of the apartments listed here are rented through agencies instead of individuals.

Step 5
Still haven’t found your studio apartment in London? Explore Loot. Loot is a popular classified ad site based out of London. They list hundreds of studios in various price ranges.

Step 6
If you’re already in London, get a copy of the Daily Mail newspaper. You’ll find many apartment listings there.

Tips & Warnings
• Apartments in London are typically called flats. Keep that in mind when you’re doing a search.
• When you see WC in an apartment ad, it means the Water Closet. This is the bathroom.
• Most rent prices are quoted on a weekly basis (pw). If you’re not sure, ask.

Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks, Gothic altarpieces and a room devoted to the Italian master Donatello are among a feast of treasures on show at the 10 new Medieval and Renaissance galleries at the museum, known locally as the V & A. In all, more than 1,000 years of history — from the fall of the Roman Empire to the end of the Renaissance — are surveyed in the galleries, which span three floors and more than 35,000 square feet in the east wing of the museum.

Built at a cost of £31.75 million (about $50 million) over seven years, the galleries feature 1,800 pieces, shown both thematically and chronologically. The opening represents the completion of the first phase of the museum’s £120 million 10-year plan to refurbish and redisplay its entire collection.
The new galleries, which opened Dec. 2, include hundreds of previously unseen pieces, necessitating a great deal of conservation work and research. “Many of the pieces have not been on display for 25 or 30 years, either because they needed work or we didn’t have the space,” said Moira Gemmill, the museum’s director of projects.

For example, the museum’s 12th-century Romanesque Trie-Château stone window arches had been in storage since 1983 because “there wasn’t a location for it,” she said. Now the museum can take the extremely rare arcade and “weave it into the overall chronology.”
Explanatory labeling, which has purposely been kept to a minimum, is complemented by computer displays at which the visitor can interact with the collection (you can flip through those da Vinci notebooks, for example; at other screens visitors can find out more about the exhibits through text and images). “We wanted the objects to be the heroes,” Ms. Gemmill said. “We didn’t want them to be crowded with graphic, contextual interpretation.”

Other objects are partnered with audio. At the “Boar and Bear Hunt” tapestry, circa 1425-30, visitors can listen to the poet Simon Armitage reading a hunt-themed passage from the 14th-century narrative poem “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.” Elsewhere, the pairings are visual. At the heart of “The Renaissance City” gallery, a courtyard is evoked with a working fountain surrounded by dramatic sculptures.

In other presentations, the scale is decidedly smaller. In an area devoted to Renaissance style and living, a cabinet contains an array of drinking glasses. But only on close inspection can the viewer note the interesting quirks. A glass, circa 1570, features a windmill apparatus for a stem; the windmill is actually a whistle that, when blown, moves the hands of a clock at the back of the stem. The trick, apparently, was to drink while the clock spun. Failure to complete that task meant the drinker had to finish as many additional glasses as the remaining number on the clock.

Science Museum in London is a part of the National Museum of science and industry. This has turned out be a very famous destination among tourists and they enjoy coming here again and again. It has a huge collection of items and the best part is they keep on bringing new ones.

“Quality is never an accident but is always a result of intelligent effort” this quotation is very much applicable with this museum for its effort in bringing out the best on a consistent basis. Science Museum provides platform for young talent from across the globe.

It was founded in 1857 under Bennet Woodcroft from the collection of Royal Society of Arts and also excess items from Great Exhibition. It has seen many phases before coming to its present form. At present it has more than 300,000 exhibits and it enjoys a lot of visitors on a regular basis per day.

Science Museum medical collection is worth mentioning and if not the best is certainly one of the best in the world. It includes Clinical Medicine, Biosciences and Public health. This museum talks about contemporary science to the public and is a place to get information about different things in an easy manner.

The Science Museum has an excellent library and until 1960 it was the Britain’s National Library for Science, Medicine and Technology. Scholars from different parts of the world get in touch with this library for related things.

It has many historical items and it is worth coming here for these items. You will be mesmerized by looking at Stevenson’s Rocket, Charles Babbage’s Difference engine, Locomotive built by George Stevenson and the famous model of DNA by James Watson’s among many others. This museum is made up of different temporary galleries as well like “Flight” – a gallery for aero planes and helicopters. You can go for “Making the Modern World” which is one of the best galleries and it houses some iconic collections as well.

“Science Night” is another interesting thing that Science museum offers. In this, 380 children along with adults can spend the night here. This is accompanied with many other activities which children will love and enjoy. Since 2001 this museum is free for all visitors and is one of the best places for British.

“The Dana Centre” is an urban bar and cafe which provides platform for some serious scientific discussion among adults. It was open in 2003 and since then has shown strong presence. Many other activities also goes on here and after it was made free for all in 2001. Since then it has been a great hit among all visitors.

Space is another historical gallery which shows and tells about human space exploration. It also shows what changes and how beneficial this space exploration has been regarding telecommunication.

London has many places to visit and it is on you which one you want to choose. If you have not been to Science Museum before, then make sure you do visit it. Among one of the most visited museums in London, Science museum is fascinating for everyone as is the city London.

The tube (underground) is the quickest transport in London and is preferred by most travelers. If you plan to travel often, buy a Travelcard which are also valid for buses in almost all the zones.

London has the benefit of being served by five airports. These are London Heathrow to the west, Gatwick to the south, Stansted to the north, Luton and the London City Airport to the east.

London buses are cheaper than an equivalent Tube journey and is the most preferred transport by the one’s who want to see the real London views. Bus passes are also available.

Serviced by five airports, London can boast to have almost every major airline in the world flying in. Heathrow is home to British Airways, Stansted to cheap Ryanair and Luton to EasyJet.

With congestion charges, parking in London is a challenge. A restricted amount of on street car parking is available as the majority of spaces are allocated to local residents.

London’s railway network gives an easy access to other parts of the country or abroad. Paddington, Victoria, St Pancras, Waterloo, London Bridge, Euston are centrally located.

London black cab experience is one not to be missed and sometimes it is even cheaper than the Tube but tend to be more expensive at night. Best place to hail the cab is from a main road.

It will be a good idea to rent a car from London when you plan to escape from the city and explore more of England. This London transport is very ideal for family travel. Not worth to use in city.

The London Pass is a must for London sightseeing, offering entry to your choice of 55 London attractions. The pass includes an all-zone Travelcard, £5 worth of free phone call.

Not all London hotels offer luggage storage facilities. Most train stations have luggage storage facilities, but you should check for particular station and fee to avoid disappointment.

Lost Property office is what you need to contact if you have lost some of your property while traveling in London. You can enquire and find out whether someone has turned in your property.