Is 9 hours enough time in London?
 

We are planning our flight back from Amsterdam and it appears we are going to be going via Heathrow. I have two options. A two hour layover or a nine hour layover. Having never been to Heathrow before I don't know, if we take the 9 hour layover will that give us enough time to leave the airport, take a few pics, eat and get back or would it not be worth the effort?

TIA.

Just make sure that you have enough time to try out one of those new fancy toilets we aren't lucky enough to have yet in the states. I hear it's exhilarating.

take the two hours..and bring disnefectant...heathrow is the most disgusting airport ive ever been in

9 days really isn't enough

That is what I wanted to take pics of.

I thought I had heard something like that before.

Eat? Will you be having the steak & kidney or the bangers and mash?

Perhaps we could start you off with a nice tripe and some faggots?

Enjoy.

We will be in Ireland and Scotland (perhaps a little England) for a week before Barcelona. Not really expecting to do an extensive visit in 9 hours.

Point taken.

Enough to spend a shitload of money...

I was there for a 10 hour lay over and I was able to see a lot of the main sites in London. I love the tube and I had a blast in the short time I was there. I have since been back to London. If you have never been I say go for it to take some pictures and see some great sites. :2 cents:

what i know is that you definitely dont want to spend 9 hours at that airport - i once did 4 and that was more than enough

9 hours, lol! Yeah that plenty of of time.... you can catch the Underground tube from within Heathrow and it takes like 45 minutes to get to Central London. You can fuck around there for 7 hours shopping in all the cheap shops like Harrods, Hamleys and Selfridges. You can also visit Soho which is a very famous tourist hot spot where you can see many Cat Walk models addorning the streets and if you are lucky maybe Niomi Cambel might be about.

You will then have like 2 hours to get back, which is plenty of time.......

BTW - if you have spare time check out a place called Brixton, its one of the safest areas of London and the people are amazing.

Oh and make sure you taste London Fish & Chips - Lady Ga Ga did afterall!

You need more then 9 hours for London :2 cents:
But for shopping that would be ok I guess.

Ireland:
See the west coast around the Cliffs of moher:
http://www.goluxetravel.com/LocalRes...s-of-Moher.jpg
If it's really windy, people jump of the 200 feet cliffs, just to blow back where they came from (if they are lucky..)

Scotland:
Around Glasgow is Loch Lomond and Trossachs, be sure to check that out. Really beautiful and worth while.

The guy's got a damn good point. If you find someone covered in tats, noserings, and doesn't speak a lick of english - that's an airport worker, likely security.

Fake Edit: DUTY FREE, MOTHERFUCKER!

KLM or AA for international flights?

AA won't help. I'd beat the fuck out of the first person who sneezed on me if I was sober.

I've been to London, it allready has enough smelly old hobo's, it doesnt need another one

dodger21 and I hopped over to Heathrow from Amsterdam for a night to catch a Kings-Ducks season opener few years back, we managed to cover almost everything 'touristic' by speed-walking and using the tubes a lot. We even filmed a documentary :)

However, the airport itself took about 2 hours to get through if I recall, due to immigration lines being ultra long.

That and by the time night came around we literally couldn't get our legs to work anymore ;p

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

Brixton sure is one hell of a place

Baddog don't forget the madame tussauds wax museum and beware of crazy people on bicycles who normally dont stop for anybody

That is what I was concerned with. Thanks.

Hey BD :-)

Why not take the tube (subway) into central London and get on a double decker bus to take in the main sites? The number 9 bus is the 'real deal' (ie not a tourist bus) see http://www.londonforfree.net/outdoor.../bustour.shtml

Have fun, and enjoy London - a truly extraordinary city:winkwink:

I love the tripe and bangers and mash comments. Americans often really do still think British food is bad, despite London being 3rd on the list of cities with the most michelin stars, behind paris and tokyo.

TBH, I'd go for the 2 hours. WIth the hassle of getting out of the airport and back again for your flight plus security, customs etc, you will only really end up with 5 hours I reckon. Not worth it. Come a day earlier and we can go out for dinner.

It is 9 hours too long. :winkwink:

plenty of time, just hop on the tube into the city then hop back on the tube easy

Go for the nine hour layover!

Ten years ago I worked at Heatrow for a travelling company, as a transfer agent. Helped people from one flight to the other. Immigration can be a pain, especially since you probably don't have a European citizenship, you will be placed in group 4, "rest of the world" and those lines are usually quite long.

If you're arriving from another European contry, you should not have to worry, since port of entry into the European Union is your first European country and then you're free to travel within the union. That would cut down on immigration lines.

If you can have your bags checked all the way, so you don't have to carry them with you that'd be great. There are no safety boxes to store bags in at the airport due to security concerns.

There is a dedicated airport-city center train between Heatrow and London. It's expensive but fast, safe and will be on time. That is very important on your way back to the airport, you do not want to get stuck in London traffic which can be really bad, especially out towards the airports. For you, I'd say it's worth spending the extra few pounds on the train, forget about taxis or busses.

Have a few Pound Sterling notes handy to buy train tickets and subway tickets once in London. Do not rely on credit cards, even though you will be able to use them everywhere. Inside the city I can recommend a cab to go to the places you want to see, cab fares are decent and will take you point to point quickly.

I would recommend "The cabinet war rooms", Prime Minister Winston Churchill's bunker during the Second World War. Very interesting and not easily experienced via the Internet or pictures. They let you go down in the actual bunker, and even if much is behind glas walls, you still can see everything and experience it.

Anchored on the river Themes you'll also find the HMS Belfast, the ship which fired the first round on D-Day. Or if you really like the imperial Brittain, a visit at the Imperial War musem is a must. Earwin Rommel's tank and many other real life busses, trains, airplanes, tanks and so on are on display there. All have their history neatly documented on signs beside them.

Forget about The Tower of London and the wax cabinett, they can be extremely crowded and long, long lines to even get in. The crown jewel's at the Tower you are even standing on a flat escalator, just to force the crowd to move.

Trafalgar Square, 10 Downing Street, Hyde Park and the Big Ben are easy enough. Maybe St Paul's cathedral , which survived the German bombs.

I would prioritize to see a few things, and eat something easy. You can eat everywhere, value your time in London higher and use it. Alot around 2-2,5 hours to get back to the airport and be ready to let them know at the security checkpoint if you're running late and they will fast track you back into the terminal, just remember which terminal you will be flying out of so you get off the train at the right platform when coming back.

That's only a few quick pointers. Hope you enjoy London, I always do!

Totally agreed! :thumbsup


Baddog... You should come & enjoy a day on the South Coast. Take some film while your here at the nudist beach :winkwink: The weather is shit today but in a cpl of days you shall find that the sun comes out & the beaches in Poole & Bournemouth are scorching!

Your welcome to come here & chill for a day, relax in the pool & chat business, Would love to meet you :2 cents:

Forgot to say, I have a few biker friends with some nice bikes ;)

One of the guys has a beautiful Harley with an amazing spray on her... He owns a few porn shops over the south coast, a cpl of brothels & a nudist club here in Bournemouth...

Would love to introduce him to you ;)

LOL. don't forget to wash it down with a nice, warm lager.

:upsidedow

I doubt 9 hours is enough in any city.

I have been in states that did not have 9 hours worth of things to see. No matter, flights booked. No layover in London. But we will be in Ireland for a week, so we might drive/ride over one day.

Thanks for the input, everyone.

Depends on the terminal to be honest.

Personally I actually think Heathrow is quite nice. And in terms of getting out to take pics you'd have plenty of time.

I work like 15 minutes from Heathrow and getting to london on a train doesnt take long at all.

Have fun!

I'm English and I hate mash and I hate steak & kidney! :D

Plus I never say bangers, I say sausage & mash if I was referring to it! ^_^

that would be warm beer.. larger is always served cold.

Good luck on that.

considering the amount of stuff to see in london, 9 days isn't enough. it might have its downsides like any city, but its one of the worlds greatest city's for a reason.

OOH OOH LLOYD COME AND STAY WITH ME COS I KNOW A BIKER! AND A PIMP! I AM SO COOL!!!111oneoneone

you can probably see lots of it, but not all

With the state of the airports and how long it takes to escape and book in again i'd be paranoid about missing the next flight.

9 hours will not be enough to get out of the airport, to central London and back to your flight again. Plus this lay over will leave you drained. To see anything decent of central London you need a couple of days.

Loch Lomond area is beautiful. Used to go Jet Skiing with my friends there. Coldest water I have ever had the pleasure of falling into tho lol.

I'll give Lloyd plenty of things he can see/do in Scotland, don't worry :)

Last June I spent 6 hours in london. It cost me $500 dollars, just for a lunch meeting, transportation to and from airports, and a place to keep my bags during the meeting.


If you are going to spend the 9 hours, then when you land, change at least $500+ into Pounds Stirling. You might feel that this is silly, and you won't need it, but TRUST ME, you will!!


Mark my words Lloyd!!! London is one of the most insanely expensive places around.



.Have fun! :)

Not by most Brits, according to what I have read. Unless that is another stereotype along the lines of the rotten teeth thing.

The thought of serving any kind of beer warm turns my stomach.

You are totally wrong. Lager is NEVER, EVER served warm here. In fact, I believe we pioneered some extra cooling systems that are used.

:thumbsup :thumbsup

Your negativity is for what, to my hospitality? :(




Baddog, Sorry about the weasels crap in your pro Brit thread... Natalie & I welcome anyone into our home, especially fellow business associates. I know you would love this fellas bike, the spray job is pretty awsome :thumbsup

Indeed..... Baddog should stay for much longer to make his trip worthwhile :2 cents:

The UK is shockingly expensive and not worth the effort. Heathrow is a truly awful airport. Not many places in the world where it's quite possible to miss a flight cause the airports ONLY access spur from the motorway is blocked, but Heathrow is it.

A taxi into central town is around £40-60 ($60-90) and might take an hour each way. Specify a touristic destination in town and have a US accent and you will, for sure, get the scenic route.

You could take the tube (subway) but its slow and smelly at all times, and in the summer, hot too. The trains have no aircon and the tunnels are only ventilated by the trains moving through them.

Food in the UK is pretty damn good as Damian says and working backwards from the food that disappointed most in the US when I was last there - Indian - I would recommend you try a good curry in the UK, but be warned, hot means HOT here.

Sometime about 20 years ago the UK swapped from bitter beer to lager beer - bitter was that warm brown shit in a glass which got us the bad rep for beer. Thankfully those days are gone and lager is server cold.

Everything in the UK is kinda small and un-impressive so its quite hard to do anything that really leaves you with a feeling of having "done" London in the way going up the entire state building or wandering about central park does. Probably why no films ever manage London-ness other than the ariel view of the Thames and Big Ben. For me anyway, it never quite feels like you've been to a centre or seen a thing that really blows you away - Visit NYC and even the view as you taxi into town the first time is exciting. The UK has no equivalent.

its never serverd warm, but ale is served at room temp. a bit like white and red wine.

lol that's one way of looking at it. so skyscrapers are more impressive than historically important architecture?

Perhaps you want to drink tea at tea time in London. Good luck.