London

Getting around

Use the Tube, Elizabeth line, Overground, DLR and buses, with Citymapper, Google Maps or TfL Go for live routing. Walk short central hops instead of diving into stations: Covent Garden–Soho, Westminster–Trafalgar Square, Borough–South Bank and much of the City are faster and better on foot. Pay consistently with one contactless card or one phone/watch per person; it automatically applies caps, including a £8.90 Zones 1–2 daily cap and £5.25 bus cap. Black cabs are reliable and accessible, but traffic and rideshare surges make cars poor at peak times; never take an unbooked minicab. Do not rent a car: parking, traffic, camera enforcement, the £18 Congestion Charge and ULEZ make it an expensive self-inflicted problem.

When to go

Late April–May and mid-September–October are the sensible choices: mild weather, decent daylight and less of the summer crush. Summer brings long evenings and events but high hotel prices, school-holiday queues and occasional heat in a city with patchy air-conditioning; Notting Hill Carnival makes west London difficult over the late-August Bank Holiday. Winter can be good value in January and early February, but it is dark, damp and prone to Christmas/New Year engineering disruptions.