Read The Fine Manuscript, aka the local website
The host shire of Thamesreach maintains a Visitors Section, because we get a regular stream of SCA visitors year round.
We've tried to highlight the most important bits about getting to London, getting around, eating and drinking, and enjoying your holy shrines and favourite museums and galleries.
SO: take a look through the pages, try some links, and then feel free to ask questions about your visit.
London Accessibility
London is a medieval and Victorian city, with 20th and 21st century structure retrofitted around it.
The benefit is that the centre of the city is very compact, and many famous sights are close together.
The easiest, cheapest and most convenient way around the centre of the city is on foot.
Streets are narrow, sidewalks (called pavements here) sometimes disappear around tight corners, and surfaces range from cobbled to paved (that means 'covered with paving stones') to concrete to asphalt roads. Curb heights vary from high to carefully graded.
If you have any problems with walking more than 10 minutes at a time, you need to plan carefully to get around the city, to enjoy your visit.
Transport for London Accessibility webpages for details about getting around on the Tube, bus, and other public transport routes
Some obvious high-priority links for people coming into London
If you've never been to London before be aware that:
* the airports are not within the city (except the smallest one). Any changes between them will take a minimum of 2-3 hours of travel through the city.
* the train stations are similarly stretched around the city. Changing between major stations means going through the Tube to get from one to another.
Heathrow Airport is the large international airport that serves London. It's west of the city, and is reachable by (in order of expense) Tube, coach bus, train and taxi.
London City Airport A small airport within the city, that has connections to other hubs like Amsterdam and Frankfurt. Reachable by public transportation (light railway and bus) and taxi.
Gatwick Airport serves several European airlines, and a few international flights. Reachable by train (from Liverpool Street Station), coach bus and taxi.
Stansted Airport for cheap flights within Europe. Reachable by coach bus, train, and taxi.
Luton Airport for other cheap flights. Reachable by coach bus, train and taxi.
National Rail Journey Planner for planning and pricing trips out of the city by train. The key is that you need to know the name of the destination (preferably the station name) to plan your trip, though you can simply enter 'London' as your departure site. The planner will pick the most reasonable route.
Transport for London is the organization that runs the buses, Tube and *some* train services within London. The TfL journey planner is better than the railway one, because you can enter a post code as your destination and it will offer you options about how to get there. Very very useful.