Renting a car in London is easy, fast and organized via AutoHuren.nl. We show the most advantageous choices from the wide car rental offer in 125 countries & 17,000 locations worldwide. We offer an all-inclusive rental car in London, at the lowest price and guaranteed the best service!
Who does not love London? Almost no one right? The bowler hats may have almost disappeared from the streets, London still exudes classic British style and solidity. At the same time, the city is still honoring its sixties nickname ‘Swinging London’. Add to this the countless sights, the almost limitless shopping opportunities, the beautiful parks and the extensive food culture, and you know that London is a city for everyone. A visit of a few days is not enough to discover everything about London. Many people regularly go to London, because there is something new to experience every time.
When you visit the British capital for the first time, London can overwhelm you. It is therefore a good idea to start with a city tour by bike . That way you will get to know London better and good guides will point you to nice places, restaurants and attractions that are less obvious. There are various providers of bike tours, an organization with Dutch speaking guides is CitySpotters .
After such a bike ride you can take a walk along the Thames and immediately see a great number of highlights of the city. Start at the famous Tower Bridge . From the walkways you have a fantastic view and you can also view the steam engines with which the bridge sections used to be served. The British Crown Jewels are kept in the nearby Tower of London . A little further you see a 61 meter high pillar, The Monument , commemorating the great fire in 1666 where a large part of London went up in flames. Further to the west is the impressive St. Paul’s Cathedral . If you continue along the Thames you will reach the parliament building with Big Ben. On the other side of the river is the London Eye Ferris wheel , where you are brought to a height of 135 meters in a closed cabin.
The British Museum is the icing on London’s giant museum cake. This museum alone is so large that you can not see everything in one day. So make a choice in advance from the enormous collection: images from Greece, Egyptian mummies, art treasures from Asia and exhibitions about the history of Great Britain.
A selection from the rest of the museum offer in London:
- Tate Museum of modern art
- National Gallery with a large collection, especially medieval, painting
- Imperial War Museum about the colonial wars: military vehicles, weapons, scale models, photographs and more.
- Charles Dickens Museum : paintings, manuscripts and furniture from the great British writer
- Science Museum : a fun ‘do’ museum about the inventions of the past and present.
However, more cities claim to be a shopper’s paradise, but the real Walhalla for shoppers is London. Oxford Street , with its department stores, is not for nothing the busiest shopping street in Europe. Great fashion brands can be found in a side street of Oxford Street, Bond Street , and in the Chelsea district, especially in Sloan Street . Designers who ever hope to kick it are concentrated in the East London neighborhoods of Brick Lane , Shoreditch and Spitalfields. In the Covent Garden district there are many specialty shops, and there is also a large covered market with handicrafts, jewelery, clothing and antiques. The Portobello Marketat the Notting Hill tube station is also fun. It will only be held on Fridays and Saturdays and you will mainly find good quality antiques, retro clothing and alternative fashion. At the Brixton metro station there is a market where immigrants populate the stalls, so many exotic ones.
After shopping, visiting a museum, or strolling through the streets, it is wonderful to have a rest in one of the parks. The large Hyde Park is adjacent to the Kensington Gardens and together they form the green heart of the city. At the Speaker’s Corner , in the northeast of Hyde Park, you can hear on Sunday what the British think of something: from politics to football, and from world peace to the London refuse collection service. And everything in between …
In and around London
London has so much to offer that you do not have to leave the city. But for people who want to look a bit further after another visit to the British capital, we have some tips.
The Kew Gardens are not really outside the city, but in a western suburb (towards Heathrow Airport). In gigantic glasshouses, but also in the open air, no less than 40,000 plants and flowers from all over the world have been brought together. One of those greenhouses, the Palm House , contains only (large) palm trees.
Are the children a bit bored after all that strolling through London? Then go to Legoland at Windsor for a day . There are scale models of famous buildings from all over Europe, but also life-size animals made entirely from lego. It is not only lego what the clock strikes, there are also super slides, roller coasters and water attractions. The little ones can also get their ‘driving license’. And if you are in Windsor anyway, you can also visit the royal palace Windsor Castle .
A little further away, but best to do if you travel with a rental car is Stonehenge . The prehistoric monument is more than 130 kilometers west of London. The monument is surrounded by mysticism; nobody knows exactly what it was for.
Parking
Outside the center of London a rental car is very good to use, but not in the city center. The city administration discouraged car use by charging a Congestion Charge and high parking fees. If you want to park your car on the street, look carefully at the provisions indicated on signs. A rule of thumb: if it is not explicitly stated that you may park there, it is probably forbidden! Sometimes you can park your car at your hotel, but often an extra fee will be charged. Ask that when you book your hotel room.
Airport
The most important and busiest airport in London is Heathrow Airport , 24 kilometers west of the city center. The second airport is Gatwick . That airport is located 45 kilometers south of the city. Stansted Airport and Luton are both 50 kilometers north of the city and are widely used by budget airlines. The fifth and smallest airport is closest to the city center: City Airportat the Docklands in the east of the city.
