My friend Maggy who lives in London shared with me her top insider tip that she uses to take friends exploring when they come to visit. We took an afternoon and followed her very-specific suggestions for visiting the Prime Meridian in Greenwich in an exciting journey that took us on boats, trains, the tube, and tunnels over the course of several hours. This is such an excellent way to see parts of London you might miss if you stay close to the basic tourist areas. Thanks, Maggy!! This was an experience our family will always remember. Being able to go and witness the Prime Meridian, the line that separates the Eastern and Western Hemisphere and is the starting point for all the world’s time zones, was a chance he couldn’t resist. The Prime Meridian is marked with the perfect photo op so your family can have fun posing for pictures standing directly on or next to the line. Greenwich itself is the cutest little city and would be worth spending a dedicated afternoon in for some exploring. We walked across Westminster bridge towards the London Eye. You’re looking for the London Eye Pier, it is located right where you see that bright pink boat in the water in this picture: If you’ve set up your phones to pay for tapping on and off the Underground, you do not need to stop at the ticket counter. You can head directly down the pier towards the boats. Just be very sure you’re standing in line for the Uber Boat by Thames Clippers. You’ll be able to tap on just before getting on the boat. The ferry runs every 30 minutes or so but there was a delay that afternoon. We stood in line for 45 minutes, so just be sure everyone has used a bathroom. You’ll be on the boat for about 40 minutes on the way to Greenwich. This was such a unique way to see the city from a more affordable boat ride as compared to the tourist boats. It is a 15 – 20 minute walk (depending on how slow you’re moving at this point in your vacation) up a fairly solid hill. It’s not very steep, but it is a long and steady incline. The most direct route was under construction during our visit, so we had to circle around up a rocky set of stairs to reach the observatory. If you are unable to do stairs, I’d check in advance to see if the paths are clear before you go. The last entrance was let in at 4:15 pm and we didn’t arrive until 4:45 pm so we missed the chance. I took this picture of the courtyard from standing outside the gates. You can see tourists posing on the line in the pavement: The bad news is that this shot is on a very cramped and tight walkway that becomes a bottleneck of people all pushing to take their turn for the picture. We had about .2 seconds to pose and grimace for a snap before we were pushed out of the way. My husband regrets that we didn’t pay for the tickets to enter the official Observatory after all the trouble we took to get to Greenwich, but we would have cut our time short doing other activities that day to make it happen. It’s a good reminder of “you just can’t see it all.” You can purchase tickets to go inside the ship but we were just as happy to take a peek at the outside and keep moving. I spotted several cute looking pubs on our way out of town, if you’re hungry there will definitely be places to stop in for something to eat or drink before you go. Look for this domed red brick building: Enter those doorways and choose to go down the stairs or take the lift down. You will literally walk right under the river to the other side! This was both horrifying and crazy to me but my engineer husband was absolutely thrilled. We took a minute to pose for a picture so you can see how far we walked under the river, the domed entrance is to the right of the picture along the water’s edge: To get back towards central London, take the DLR from Island Gardens to Bank. You can tap on and off the DLR just like you did with the Uber boat and the tube and all of today’s journey goes towards your daily cap. I was distracted with my family and forgot to take a picture of the view, but here’s a great example of the kind of things you’ll see from the train:
