- [Announcer] Yellow Productions presents.
- The best free things to do in London.
I'm Chris.
This is Yellow Productions.
I do travel guides that are fun, informative, entertaining.
This is part of my series on London.
You can find more of them linked in the description below
or at the end of this video.
But in this video I'm gonna be telling you
things you can do in London,
which is a pretty expensive city, but for free.
So here we go.
The first thing to do for free,
one of the best, most famous in London,
is the changing of the guards in front of Buckingham Palace.
This has been going on for a long long time.
It's most days.
Sometimes it's odd days.
You really have to check the website for when it happens.
It's about 11 A.M. but it's gonna take up
about two hours of your time if you really wanna see it
because crowds start forming around 10 in the morning.
The main activities take place at 11 and then 11:30 a.m.
The places you want to stand if you're coming
for the changing of the guard
is right along the fence lines
so you can see what's happening inside the palace
or, not at the fence line, then you wanna stand
up on the high ground in front of Victoria Memorial
right up here.
So again, get here before 10 a.m.
because if you don't, you're gonna find yourself
way far in the back and not really enjoying everything.
And don't leave before 11:34,
because 11:34 a.m. is when they open up
the gates of Buckingham Palace
and that's when everybody parades out
and if you left before that,
you'll totally feel like you missed it out.
It's kind of slow and long,
but really the activity is at the end.
So if you come to London you have to check out
the changing of the guards.
Be aware of pickpockets because there's so many people.
The police are out in force
and they'll tell you while you're watching the guards,
people will be watching you to pick your pocket.
So make sure you have your stuff in front of you,
you know where your wallet is,
so you don't get thieved.
Speaking of royalty, no visit to London will be complete
without a visit to London's Royal Parks.
Eight Royal Parks in London make up 5,000 acres
of green space.
Actually many people think London's a big urban sprawl
but 48% of London is actually green space.
But a lot of the parks used to be either Kings' backyards
or royal hunting grounds,
but now they're parks that you and I can enjoy.
Hyde Park behind me is certainly one of the biggest
next to Kensington Gardens, one of the most popular.
It's got a neat place called Speaker's Corner,
which is this corner right back here behind me.
It's right at the Marble Arch tube station
and if you come here on a Sunday,
lots of very interesting people are standing up
on soap boxes talking about whatever
from politics to aliens invading,
so definitely check out Speaker's Corner at Hyde Park.
But also just enjoy these parks
to get away from the hustle and bustle.
You can do a walk where you connect a number of the parks.
And certainly while you're at Buckingham Palace
to watch the changing of the guard,
stroll through the park there.
This time of year, I was here April,
there were some neat cherry blossom trees,
neat lakes in most of these parks,
so they just are maintained pretty well
and some pretty nice park land.
For some of the best free views in London,
come up to the observatory at the Sky Garden.
This is inside what's often known
as the Walkie Talkie Building
because of its unique shape.
It's located right near the Tower of London.
This is much more of a tower.
The admission to this three story observatory is free.
There's 360 degree views of London,
kind of a landscape garden here.
There's a couple of restaurants, some bars.
There's also an outdoor terrace
that looks south to the Thames River.
It's really a pretty neat place.
But I will say, it's slightly warm on a hot day,
which it kind of is today.
It's not very well air conditioned,
but it is cool, and for free, you can't beat it.
You do have to book tickets ahead of time on their website.
SkyGarden.London is the website.
They open them up Mondays for the following week
so make sure you hit the website on a Monday
to secure your ticket.
They give you a time ticket.
You just have a barcode, get here your time,
whisk yourself up the elevator,
and then here you are at the top of the Sky Garden
with some amazing views.
And looking out across the Thames
you can see the other tall building, The Shard.
That observatory much more expensive than this one.
Another great free thing to do in London
is to take a walk along the Thames,
particularly the South Bank of the Thames right here.
This is the Queen's Walk.
Come in on a weekend, you'll find
a lot of the tourists in London doing this walk.
But it's a really great way to get
an appreciation for London
and the reason why you walk along the South Bank
is because most of the major sites,
they're on the North Bank, and so you can see them
from the South Bank.
It's a great walk to do from Westminster,
from the Westminster Bridge,
all the way to the Tower Bridge,
which, I don't know, can you see it behind me?
Probably not, it's blocked by that Tom's Kitchen,
but the Tower Bridge, that's the famous bridge
with the tower on it that everybody thinks
is the London Bridge, but the London Bridge
is actually, well the London Bridge is
that super ugly bridge back there.
You can do the walk as a round trip.
You can walk on both sides,
on the South Bank this way, Tower Bridge,
come back and then walk along the North Bank too.
Another free thing to do in London
is to watch the street performers.
There's street performers all over London
but you'll find the biggest concentration of them
at Covent Garden right here.
And there's somebody doing some performance at the moment.
They're free to watch.
They would appreciate a couple pounds, certainly,
as gratuity, but you're not required to give
if you don't find them entertaining.
And this place is great 'cause usually
when one person is done performing,
another one will come out.
I just finished watching a break dancing performance.
Those guys were pretty talented.
(upbeat music)
And now there's this guy.
I'm not exactly sure what he's doing.
Hey, but maybe when you come to London you'll find him
and see what he's doing.
And of course no trip to London
would be complete without a visit
to Picadilly Circus.
This is London's equivalent to Times Square,
bright lights, neon signs, really, the center of it all.
It's not quite as big as Times Square
but it is a place that you have to come
to feel the energy.
While you're at Picadilly Circus,
this connects very well to China Town, Lester Square,
the Theatre District, or Oxford Street the other way,
for really ritzy shopping.
So lot's of stuff to do once you make it here.
When you're done admiring
the main Picadilly Circus intersection,
there's a couple cool stores to check out just nearby.
There's M&M's World that's a few floors
of just M&M themed things.
You don't have to go in and buy anything.
It's just totally neat to look around.
And then right across the street from M&M World
there's the Lego Store.
It's like three stories of legos.
They've got a big Lego dragon.
That's another one that's just fun
to go in and walk around.
Inside they've even got a Lego Big Ben
and a Lego London telephone booth.
And it's even got a telephone inside.
The buttons don't do anything though.
Would anybody like to take a guess
which my favorite M&M is?
Hmm, hmm?
And right between the two stores,
if you're here on the hour, you can hear
the musical bell which has a little show
of these characters going around.
Another spot for a great free view
is the top of the Tate Modern Museum.
This one's along the South Bank of the Thames.
You can even come up to the 10th floor of this museum.
Admission is free and it's got pretty good views
from up here too.
This one you can see The Shard back there
on the South Bank and then you can see
the Sky Garden on the other side.
Also while you're at the Tate Modern,
definitely check out some of the modern art.
The art here is very interesting.
Another free thing to do in London
is to go window shopping.
Well, maybe not buying things,
but looking in the department store windows.
Many London department store windows
have really intriguing window displays,
some still life, some animated.
This one's a shoe car wash.
Walk up and down Oxford Street.
Check 'em out.
Also head out to Harrods in Knightsbridge as well.
Another free thing to do in London
is to rent a bicycle.
There's all these bicycle racks across London
and look, this is almost as good as free.
It costs two pounds.
You put your credit card into this machine right here.
It'll unlock a bike.
And if you ride it for less than 30 minutes at a time,
it's only two pounds for the next, well, 30 minutes
for the next 24 hours.
Check 'em out.
You'll see these things all over London.
Just be careful where you ride your bike.
You can't ride your bike on the sidewalk.
You can ride it on the streets or dedicated bicycle paths.
This one's also almost free.
Take one of the city's scenic double decker buses.
No, I don't mean one of those expensive
hop on hop off buses,
I mean the city's public buses.
They're double decker.
The front of it, if you get a seat right up there
it's a really cool spot.
You get a bird's eye view of the city.
The best buses are number four and 88.
They run through the center of the city.
Note, though, they don't take cash.
You do need to use an oyster card.
You can buy these at any tube station,
one pound 50 pence.
Check it out.
Take a bus ride.
And when I said not the hop on hop off buses,
don't confuse the public buses for these right here.
These ones are the hop on hop off buses.
They'll cost you a lot more.
Thanks for watching.
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Alright, bye bye.