London is not only the largest city in the United Kingdom, but the biggest of the European Union: visiting all the monuments and the museums in one day is impossible. This does not mean that it is not worth visiting, even when you are in London for a short time: if you follow my itinerary with all the emblematic monuments of the capital – leaving aside the museums which need more time – one day in London is enough to discover the most popular places in the city.

Let’s assume your day in London starts at 9 in the morning in Victoria, a neighborhood in the heart of the city with an important train and bus station. If you arrive at the station or find an underground stop nearby, I recommend you to go to a counter with personal or automatic to request the Visitor Oyster Card, a rechargeable pass that will allow you to travel on public transport. £ 15 is more than enough to visit all the places that we will introduce you to in this article. If you prefer to walk and limit the use of public transport as much as you can, a contactless payment is enough to use the metro and buses if you need it.

London has 5 main airports and one of these, Heathrow, is one of the most important airports in the world by number of passengers. Around 1303 planes leave and arrive every day from Heathrow.

Westminster and Trafalgar Square

About twenty minutes walk from Victoria Station, and a stone’s throw from the side of the river Thames, you will find the Big Ben, one of the most famous clocks in the world, overlooking the London Eye, located across the river. (To get there by tube, take the Circle Line or the District Line to Westminster Station).

But that’s not all you have to visit in the area: we are in fact in the Westminster district, where the English parliament is located. Looking around you can see the House of Parliament, Westminster Palace and the splendid Westminster Abbey, the place where British sovereigns are crowned. Access to the abbey is free for those who have the London Pass.

I recommend that you spend an hour in this beautiful neighborhood full of history before venturing towards Trafalgar Square (13 minutes on foot or 6 minutes by bus taking the number 88 from Parliament Square to Trafalgar Square). In the center of this important square is the statue of Horatio Nelson, the British admiral who defeated France and Spain in the battle of Trafalgar. Behind it you will find the National Gallery, a free art museum founded in 1824.

Buckingham Palace and parks of London

You can now walk south-west to The Mall, a beautiful tree-lined avenue that connects the Admiralty Arch (a stone’s throw from Trafalgar Square) to Buckingham Palace (16 minutes on foot), skirting St. James’s Park.

You will arrive at the official residence of Queen Elizabeth, where every day starting 11:15 am you can watch the famous change of guard, which lasts about half an hour. Once the ceremony is over, go through Green Park, located immediately to the left of Buckingham Palace, to reach the famous Hyde Park (16 minutes on foot), an ideal place to relax, contemplate nature and visit the famous Speaker’s Corner. This is the name of a corner of the park still in use today where great figures of the past, including George Orwell, Karl Marx and Lenin, exposed their ideas to the public, creating a place for promoting and defending freedom of expression.

A long weekend in London: what to visit?

Shopping in Oxford Street

It is now time for lunch. Heading north-east you will arrive at Marble Arch. On your right you will find Oxford Street, a large street full of shops and cafés where you can have a bite to eat before spending a couple of hours shopping and buying souvenirs. At Oxford Circus underground station there is the intersection of Oxford Street and Regent Street, another London shopping street. Heading south you will come to Piccadilly Circus, a sdawaethat has become famous for its large bright advertising screens. If shopping isn’t your thing, you can go directly to the next destination by taking the Central Line at Marble Arch to the Tottenham Court Road stop.

Leicester Square is only a five minute walk from Piccadilly: in this area you will find the famous Odeon Cinema (where all the big movie stars are invited for the premières), the Chinese district of London Chinatown and many theaters and restaurants.

St. Paul’s Cathedral and Covent Garden

Then take the Piccadilly Line to Leicester Square and change to Holborn to take the Central Line to St. Paul’s Cathedral. If you prefer to walk, continue east for half an hour and you will arrive at St. Paul’s Cathedral, the largest religious building in Britain, completed in the early 18th century. South of the cathedral you will find the Millennium Bridge, the famous pedestrian bridge that had to be closed only two days after the inauguration due to vibrations due to the large number of passersby. Across the river, on your left, you can see The Shakespeare Globe (a replica of the famous Elizabethan theater) and in front of it the Tate Modern, a museum of contemporary art. From here, head west for a short walk along the river, then head north across the Waterloo Bridge.

It is almost time to leave the capital, but not without having diner first. You are now very close to Covent Garden (Savoy Street stop on the Central Line starting from the cathedral), a neighborhood plenty of shops, restaurants, pubs and bars where you can eat and have a cocktail before departure. You can then take the underground which will take you back to Victoria (from Covent Garden Station, take the Piccadilly Line and change at Green Park Station to take the Victoria Line to Victoria Station).

Now we know that visiting London is possible. What have you visited? Tell us in the comments.

Discover and get to know London, a wonderful city with a thousand faces.

London is not only the capital of the United Kingdom or the largest city in Europe or the third most populous city on the continent (8.5 million) after Moscow and Istanbul. London is second only to New York in the ranking of the most important and influential cities in the world and represents the main financial center of the entire planet.

Most people say that when you are in London – and I do not necessarily mean in “The City”, the business and finance district – you have the strong feeling of being in the center of the world, as if you were in the place from which the most important decisions start, in the headquarters of a multinational company called “Earth”.

Get to know London, city of opportunities

That’s right, it is one of its most beautiful and characteristic aspects, which makes it one of the most sought-after permanent destinations – probably the number one in the world – and an object of desire for those who want to make a fortune.

London is a big city and you will have no trouble finding a job quickly.

There are several tools to look for work:

• The most official tool to look for work is the Job Center, the efficient free placement service spread throughout the territory. They are public offices you can go to and have the opportunity to independently consult the many job vacancies on display or fill in a special form and leave your Curriculum Vitae.
• Facebook groups: many people use Facebook groups and help each other by providing information on available jobs.
• Websites: Gumtree, Indeed, Reed.co.uk, Totakljob etc.
• Certainly very effective and suggested method is to print a bunch of CVs and distribute them by hand once arrived in the UK. To get some info about it, read our post about the importance of CVs.

Work and investment in London

The fear of losing your job and remaining unemployed does not exist in this city, on the contrary, there is a tendency to often leave a job to look for a better and more profitable one. Salaries are generally higher than in many other european countries and the incentive system of work allows you to improve your income over time thanks to the achievement of higher levels given by seniority and performance. Furthermore, the limited and simplified English bureaucracy allows you to open a business very quickly and at very limited costs, in fact, London is a city that hosts a huge number of international companies, including many Americans, Italian, French and Spanish ones. The highest number of businesses is in the hospitality, over 2,000 Italian restaurants. Punctuality and respect for payments are among the things that people appreciates most.

The modernity of London, the second most important city in the world

Museums and palaces. Get to know London and its attractions

One of these, which has become a real icon of London, is the Tower Bridge, the most famous opening bridge in the world built in the late 1800 and which connects the two sides of the Thames near the Tower of London (from which it takes its name and represents one of the main attractions). Inside the bridge you can buy a ticket (about 10 pounds) for the Tower Bridge Experience, the permanent exhibition inside the bridge that allows you to see the gears that once opened the bridge, to look through the glass floor and to know the history of the bridge that had made the whole world talk about it for its beauty and for its innovative mechanical devices, considered an authentic engineering marvel.

You will surely have seen on TV, perhaps during some news of the English royalty, Buckingham Palace, the official residence of the sovereign of the United Kingdom, where thousands of tourists every year go to attend the traditional change of guard. It is also possible to visit other areas of the castle with guided tours (£ 20-40).

It is almost impossible to find a person who has never seen or heard of Big Ben, the most famous watch in the world. In reality Big Ben is the nickname given to the largest bell of the clock tower, the Elizabeth Tower, and is part of the majestic Westminster Palace, also built in the nineteenth century, known as Houses of Parliament where the two chambers of parliament are based . The palace actually arose in the 11th century, but due to the disastrous fire in 1834 it was completely rebuilt, with the exception of Westminster Hall which represents, in fact, the only original part built in 1097.

Big Ben, the most famous watch in the world

If you want to appreciate other historical works, you must absolutely see Saint Paul’s Cathedral, the largest and most important British church that was built in the late 1600, and Westminster Abbey (11th century), the second most important Anglican place of worship; the Kensington Palace (where you can take the tour of the royal apartments for about £ 20).

Also in the nineteenth century (1840) another symbol of London was born, the gigantic and spectacular Trafalgar Square, built in memory of the battle won by Admiral Nelson to the detriment of the Franco-Spanish fleets during the Napoleonic wars. On the north side of the square you can find the National Gallery Museum.

Access to London’s many museums

Speaking of museums, if you are passionate about art and culture you are in the right place because one of the peculiarities of this city is the ability to access most of the museums for free. They are so many and beautiful that I would not know which to suggest. If you are passionate about history and archaeological finds you should definitely go to the British Museum, one of the largest and most visited in the world, as well as the oldest. If you love paintings you cannot miss the exhibition of over 2300 pieces (including Botticelli, Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Raffaello, Leonardo da Vinci) of the National Gallery; if instead you are fascinated by contemporary art, you must go to the Tate Modern, the most visited museum of modern art in the world; if you want to know the history of London since prehistoric times, then you must see the spectacular Museum of London; instead, the Natural History Museum, projects you into the evolutionary journey of the world and mankind. Click here if you want to access the full list of London museums.

London is also a city full of theaters and you have probably heard of the Royal Opera House, the most prestigious in the city and one of the most famous in the world. It is also called Covent Garden, because of the neighborhood in which it is located. Speaking of Covent Garden, let me spend a few words on this fantastic and fun neighborhood, in particular of its homonymous square which is certainly one of the funniest in all London. Here you can admire jugglers and many street artists who make a living by exhibiting their beautiful shows. Then there is a theater which, beyond its performances, is one of the major attractions of the city: the Shakespeare’s Globe Theater (ticket price £ 20).

London city of music and musicians

I don’t know if there are more musically active cities of London around the world. Many music international stars are born here and be sure that every day some of them is performing somewhere in the city. Maybe at the Royal Albert Hall, an event room (concerts, ballets, boxing, wrestling, conferences etc.) with only 5500 seats, but very exclusive. One of its peculiarities is the gigantic and suggestive pipe organ (about 10,000).

London, in addition to being a place where many artistic and cultural attractions are concentrated, is also a city full of different attractions and famous for an infinite number of reasons. Monuments such as Saint Paul’s Cathedral or the Tower of London may not sound familiar to you, but you surely know Harrods, the most famous luxury store in the world, or the illuminated sign of Coca Cola in Piccadilly Circus or the famous markets of Camden Town, or the renowned Madame Tussauds wax museum.

Madame Tussauds – some real waxes

One of the most modern attractions together with the London Eye, the tallest ferris wheel in the world with its 135 meters and 32 capsules as per the number of districts in London, is The Shard, the 310 meter high glass skyscraper designed by Renzo Piano, the highest in all western Europe and from which you can observe (telescopes and representations of ancient London) a real overview of London from above. The ticket for the lookout has a cost of £ 25.

From up there you realize how green London is; the area occupied by parks and gardens is 47% of the entire city, 180 km2. London’s parks are a bit like for other countries the sea or the mountain: places of leisure and amusement crowded especially during the summer and the beautiful sunny days. Their interior is often populated by numerous animals, lakes (also navigable) trees and entertainments for children. They are often home to concerts or various events.

Our article about London is constantly evolving and developing as London is a city on which we could build an entire site.

Contribute with us, if you think we have forgotten something or want us to talk about a specific topic, write in the comments below.

Happy reading and … welcome to London!