Scot Stirling

Review of Big Bus Tours - London

Never again. It seems pretty basic to the operatio...

Never again. It seems pretty basic to the operation of a "service" like this that the bus will actually go and stop where it is supposed to stop (according to the map provided to us), and NOT go and stop at TEN other places we were not supposed to go, according to the same map. We got on the "Blue" line bus because we wanted to stop at Westminster Abbey and later the National Gallery. For some reason (without notice or any explanation), after crossing the bridge from Lambeth Palace, the bus did not stop at the Westminster Abbey or Parliament Square stop (stops 22 and 23 on the map I was given when I purchased the pass), but took off along Horseferry Road and then Victoria Street. We then picked up the route somewhere near Buckingham Palace and, near Hyde Park Corner, turned left when I was expecting to continue toward the Marble Arch (as shown on the map) and headed out to Kensington. Once again, I didn't know where we were going until we were passing Harrod's, which told me that our "Blue" line bus had somehow turned into an "Orange" line bus and was making a long run around a part of the city that I had no interest in seeing, in very slow-moving traffic. We made ten stops before we got back to the Marble Arch and resumed the Blue line course. When we got to Baker Street, our bus stopped and didn't move for a long time, because another Big Bus was stopped in front of us and wasn't moving. When that bus finally pulled away, our bus pulled forward and stopped, and only then did we learn that we were going to start waiting all over again for a change in drivers. And there I saw a large route map on the side of the kiosk that showed Blue and Red line routes that looked nothing like the map I had been provided, or the maps that were available inside the bus. You can't plan your time or your visit using this service, because you don't know where they will actually take you. Never again.