Our last day in London started with a visit to Borough market for croissants for breakfast. The plans include a Walk on Walk off Tour of the art at the National Gallery and tea with some friends at the gallery. We had a bit of a late start. The tour didn’t start until the afternoon and I wanted to get a jump on packing our bags for the cruise.
Even with our late start we still arrived early for the tour and had some time to people watch. The National Gallery is located beside Trafalgar Square so there is lots to see.
Art at the National Gallery
After a short wait, we met with our guide. For the first time taking the WOWO tours, we were with another couple for the tour. Our guide was no nonsense and had ten pieces of art to show us. The National Gallery is large and full of art from any well-known names. We saw artworks from Caravaggio, Vincent van Gogh, Monet, Leonardo da Vinci, Botticelli, Cezanne, and Turner. They also have Bathers at Asnières by Georges Seurat, sadly that Gallery was closed when we were there.
Our guided tour was over quickly. It wasn’t the best that we had taken. We still had plenty of time before we were meeting for tea, so we picked up some audio guides and continued to tour the art. The security guards in the gallery were helpful in directing us through the galleries. One of the guards informed us that, the James Bond movie, Skyfall, had filmed in one of the galleries. James Bond broke through the window in the picture below.
There is a lot to see at the gallery and I would budget 4-5 hours if you really want to see most of the art. We visited on a Saturday and it was fairly crowded. Make sure you visit the gift shop, they have a huge assortment of postcards and they sell stamps.
Afternoon Tea
We met up with our friends for Tea in the National Cafe. They had made a reservation for the 5 of us. It was nice to meet-up with them again. We had cruised together on the Disney Fantasy in 2012. The afternoon tea was good and very filling. The service was a bit confused I think it took three tries for our waiter to get the bills correct.
A Stroll to Buckingham Palace
After we finished our tea we made our way outside and realized it was still early. We found ourselves standing in Trafalgar Square again. It is not far from Buckingham Palace. Since we had not made it near the Palace we decided to take our time and walk over, get some pictures, and then head back to the hotel. The best way to experience a city is to go for a walk. Our walk in London was full of interesting and historic sites.
After a lovely walk through St. James Park we made it to Buckingham Palace. There is a large round about in front of the Palace and we had to walk around to find our way over to the Victoria Memorial. Once there we took the obligatory selfies before it got to dark.
Packing Up
I don’t remember how we got back to the hotel after our walk. I think we walked through Green Park to the Green Park station. It was getting late by the time we made it back. We got dinner from Nando’s and we spent the evening packing our bags and possibly watching Countdown.
If you enjoyed this post and wanted to read more about our trip please check out my other posts about our planning, travelling to London, our first day in London, visiting the Borough Market and our visit to the British Museum and Tour for Muggles, Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, and more museums. As well as stateroom tours of our secret porthole rooms 6006 and 5520.
Read my final thoughts about our time and London.
Update We returned to London again in 2019 with my sister and revisited the Tower of London, Westminster Abbey and the Natural History Museum. We also visited Buckingham and Kensington Palace, saw Hamilton and did a graffiti tour.
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