British Natural History Museum, Tower of London, Victoria & Albert Museum, The British Museum, Sacre Coeur
British Natural History Museum
The first museum that we visited was the British Natural History Museum in Kensington, near Hyde Park in London. This was the day that we were arriving in London in the morning, so we got tickets for 2:00 pm. You can get free tickets on the website ahead of time.
We were staying in the Paddington Station area, so once we checked in, we walked through Hyde Park to the museum. You can also take the Tube to the South Kensington Station. We had to walk a bit to figure out where we were going since we were brand new to London. Once we found it, we got right in. They didn’t even need our tickets, but them just in case.
A lot of this day was a blur since we were dealing with jet lag and trying to stay up till later, but my favorite part of the museum was the architecture of the building. It was beautiful. I spent more time looking at the building than the exhibits. This is a huge museum with plenty of exhibits, you won’t get bored. The grand hall has a huge whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling. The kids will love the large dinosaur exhibit along with an animated dinosaur.
There is a large cafe with plenty of tables in the museum. We found restrooms downstairs where it was nice and quiet, and there were tables around the area to sit and eat if you’d like. There is also a large courtyard. It looks like the kids can wade in the pool when it’s warm.
I love that so many of the museums in London are free. Definitely try and go here, we were glad that we did. But be careful which door you go out of. We went out the opposite door that we came in with and ended up lost, and could not find the Tube station. We were exhausted but ended up having to walk through Hyde Park to get back to our hotel.
Tower of London
You might say that the Tower of London is not a museum, but it is. This compound is so much bigger than it looks, also. This museum is not free, but is definitely worth paying for. Approximately 35 pounds ($44.48) for adults and 18 pounds ($22.87) for children ages 5-15. Under 5 is free.
To get there take the Tube to the Tower Hill Station, it’s not far from there, and there are signs. It’s best to buy your tickets ahead of time on the website to be guaranteed entrance.
We didn’t take a Yeoman Warder tour, but I do recommend it. The tours are included in your ticket, and you learn a lot of interesting facts about the tower. I’ve watched a few on YouTube, and the Yeoman Warder’s are very interesting and humorous. Also included are the Crown Jewels. There was no line when we went, but I hear that there can be very long lines at times. Mostly, the building contains the actual Crowns worn by Royalty in England. They are beautiful. However, you cannot take pictures in the Crown Jewel building for security reasons.
You can also see the famous Ravens. Their wings are clipped so that they don’t fly away, but they are treated well and have the run of the entire complex. We saw them all over the area.
There are a couple of restrooms in the complex, and a small food area, plus a gift shop where you can buy bottled water.
The Tower of London complex is much larger than it looks, and you can go into a couple of museums, including the White Tower main building. There is quite a bit of climbing in the complex if you want to see anything. I believe that I saw a wheelchair lift in the large central building but didn’t see it being used. We also climbed to the top of the wall and got some great views. What I loved was the history of the entire complex since I have ancestry in William the Conqueror.
The Victoria and Albert Museum
We visited the Victoria and Albert Museum in South Kensington, which is also free, on the afternoon that we got back from Paris on the Eurostar. You don’t need tickets to get in either, just show up. The museum is open late on Fridays, so that was perfect timing for us. We could have hiked through Hyde Park to get there, but we had been walking a lot for days so we took the Circle Line to South Kensington Station, which is a short walk to the museum.
The V&A museum is another must do huge museum with lots to explore. It’s amazing that there are so many wonderful museums in London that are free to get into. Of course, special exhibits will cost more, but those are at the discretion of the museum goer. I think that my favorite room was the one with all of the castings, like the casting of the David statue.
There are many exhibits to look at, and the museum is beautiful. I love the colorful rooms with so much beauty. We only had a few hours in this museum, but you could spend a day here checking everything out. I particularly loved the ancient religious artifacts that are contained in the museum. I’m not sure if it will be crowded earlier in the day, but since we went in the afternoon, it was delightfully uncrowded.
This is another must do free attraction in London, I definitely recommend it.
The British Museum
This is the big one that you don’t want to miss! And as a bonus it’s also free, but you need to get your tickets online at The British Museum website. We also had Afternoon Tea at the Great Court Restaurant in the courtyard of the museum. It was one of the cheaper Tea’s in London, but still good.
We got to the museum at around 10:00 am on a Saturday, and the line was so long it was around the block. Since we had a reservation I went to talk to the guard, who let us in right away, bypassing all the people in line. And it’s a good thing because on a Saturday, this museum is very crowded. There were a lot of tour groups from different countries there, and we ended up leaving some areas and coming back later.
This is another huge museum, and a definite must see. Some of the exhibits are controversial, and some say some of them are stolen. I really don’t know about that, but I am happy to see this much history in one place. There were a large amount of tour groups visiting on the Saturday we were there. If it gets too crowded in once place, just move to a different room and come back later.
Sacre Coeur
We only had a few hours left in Paris until we had to leave to get back to London on the Eurostar train. We had just enough time to make a visit to Sacre Coeur Basilica in the Monmartre area of Paris on the most beautiful weather day of our trip.
You can take the Metro fairly close to the Basilica. We got off at the Anvers station, but from there it is quite a walk up a hill, then up to what seemed like a million steps. I’m sure that there are other ways to get there, I believe that there is an incline railway to get people up the tall hill, but I didn’t see it.
It doesn’t cost anything to go through the Basilica, although I believe that it costs to go up into the dome. It’s a very busy area and there was a long line to get into the basilica when we went, but we walked around the outside and took pictures, and then the line was shorter. The line did move quickly. You can get very nice pictures of Paris from above, and you can see the Eiffel Tower from there.
It is a beautiful church, just like most Roman Catholic churches. It has a central main sanctuary, and then a number of other little nooks with statues and beautiful windows around the exterior walls of the building. This is the only church that we were able to visit in our 24 hours in Paris, except for Notre Dame. Notre Dame was not open yet when we were there to see the inside. I would recommend going to Sacre Coeur if you’re in the area.
So, those are the museums we visited on our short trip to London and Paris. Everything seemed like a blur once we got home because we crammed so much into our 5 day trip, but we watched YouTube vlogs of each place we visited to remember everything that we had seen. I’d recommend more than 5 days to visit both Paris and London so that you can relax and enjoy it more. Most of these museums were free, except for the Tower of London. They do take donations with handy credit card donation machines and donations boxes everywhere. We hope to go back some day, and hopefully it will be soon.
The Quiet Cruiser 