Houses of Parliament

Ordered tickets over the net before our trip, picked them up at the ticket office. Scheduled a 9:30 tour which was a great idea, no lines that early. They recommended being there 30 minutes early, but I'd say 15 minutes is OK if you're there for the first tour in the morning. Our tour guide was excellent (and fresh, since it was her first of the day). Tour takes about 90 minutes with almost no breaks to sit, so be prepared. The whole family enjoyed the tour, even my 14 year old found plenty to be interested in. A fine cafe is there at the end of the tour. Would strongly recommend!

I'm not into politics but my husband is and insisted we visit here. Parliament was sitting so no tours available and we had to q for the visitors gallery. So we join the q which wasn't to long because it was fairly early in the morning and because we were only 2 people among lots of school/tour groups the person on the gate moved us forward in the q. We went straight into the commons gallery and watched the proceedings for quite some time before emerging back into the main lobby. We wanted to visit the Lord's gallery but had been told previously we would have to go back outside and q all over again, so I found a nice "bobby" and asked him if we really had to do this and because it wasn't that busy that day he allowed us to go stright into the Lord's gallery. WOW how impressive. I was surprised how interested I became watching the debates in the different houses just a shame Tony Blair wasn't there.

TIP. As you leave thru Westminster Hall take a note. This is the only surving bit of the original houses of parliament that survived fire. It was where Sir THomas More was tried and sentenced. It was where the Queen Mother's coffin lay in state before her funeral and look up to the most amazing hammerbeam roof ever. All totally original!!!!

I didn't plan on taking a tour of the Houses of Parliament, and it was a sort of spur-of-the-moment decision that I made upon actually seeing the beautiful facade of the building, and I am extremely glad that I took the tour! I can't say my tour guide was very informative - I managed to pick up a few scrambled facts about the building and the parliament - but I might chalk that up to the fact that it was a large tour and it was hard to hear with a few screaming toddlers in our herd. It might also have been the whole British accent thing. It was still very cool to be able to an important governmental building and be able to sit in the same chairs that representatives sit in, etc. The building itself is absolutely grand. I honestly thought it was much older than 19th century, perhaps medieval, but that just shows what I know about London history I guess! :)

I grew up in St. Petersburg, which has a lot of impressive palaces with gilded walls and tons of sparkliness, but I honestly loved the Parliament house more. It has a very refined interior - Victoria's husband sure did know how to decorate.

The food in their cafeteria isn't half bad either!