Julie Cork

Review of Big Bus Tours - London

Did not enjoy this tour at all. We did a 2-day tic...

Did not enjoy this tour at all. We did a 2-day ticket which included a walking tour, river cruise, and a 'panoramic night tour'. We thought the hop on hop off would be a great way to see London as they stop at many of the big attractions but traffic was so slow we would have been moving faster by walking. We were given the wrong map at tourist information so ended up on a completely different route than we thought the first time we got on. The red line has live guides but they weren't very good. You could see the guides were listening to the pre-recorded tour and just repeating what they heard, sometimes with a slight twist. The blue line only had the pre-recorded audio guide which wasn't very good, especially since we were going so slowly. Something would play for 30 seconds every 5 minutes or so and that was all. Plus, only about half of the audio devices worked so if the bus was busy there was a good chance you wouldn't be able to listen to the audio at all. The river cruise was good, the live commentary on that was funny and informative. It was a good way to see the city from another angle and going to Greenwich was a good break from the hustle and bustle of the main attractions. The 'panoramic night tour' was a HUGE disappointment. It was basically the same as the normal red line tour but without live guides?! We thought this would provide a fun way to the see the city at night and maybe have better commentary but we were wrong. We almost fell asleep and got off after just a few stops. Overall, this tour was NOT worth the money we spent and would not recommend this company to other people travelling to London. You would be better off just doing a free walking tour to the main sites to get some history and paying for a river cruise then using the tube or buses to get around.