In the vaults beneath London Bridge, this historical if somewhat tacky attraction takes you on a whistle-stop tour of London’s dark past. Things ratchet up from a tame museum to full-on haunted house as you descend past a series of 14th-century tombs and plague pits – real ones – while animatronic rodents and costumed and bloodied actors frighten the bejesus out of unsuspecting groups. Book tickets online in advance to jump the queue and save on the hefty entry fee.
London Bridge Experience & London Tombs
South Bank
Lonely Planet's must-see attractions
22.35 MILES
The world’s largest and oldest continuously occupied fortress, Windsor Castle is a majestic vision of battlements and towers. Used for state occasions, it…
1.75 MILES
A splendid mixture of architectural styles, Westminster Abbey is considered the finest example of Early English Gothic. It's not merely a beautiful place…
0.49 MILES
One of London's most amazing attractions, Tate Modern is an outstanding modern- and contemporary-art gallery housed in the creatively revamped Bankside…
3.87 MILES
With its thunderous, animatronic dinosaur, riveting displays about planet earth, outstanding Darwin Centre and architecture straight from a Gothic fairy…
0.68 MILES
Sir Christopher Wren’s 300-year-old architectural masterpiece is a London icon. Towering over diminutive Ludgate Hill in a superb position that's been a…
0.54 MILES
Few parts of the UK are as steeped in history or as impregnated with legend and superstition as the titanic stonework of the Tower of London. Not only is…
0.4 MILES
Seeing a play at Shakespeare's Globe – ideally standing under the open-air "wooden O" – is experiencing the playwright's work at its best and most…
1.88 MILES
With almost six million visitors trooping through its doors annually, the British Museum in Bloomsbury, one of the oldest and finest museums in the world,…
Nearby South Bank attractions
0.06 MILES
Southwark Cathedral, a mostly Victorian construction but with a history dating back many centuries earlier, was the nearest church to what was once the…
0.1 MILES
Step aboard this replica of privateer Sir Francis Drake's Golden Hinde, the warship that circumnavigated the globe in 1577–1580. Kids will love exploring…
3. Old Operating Theatre Museum & Herb Garret
0.11 MILES
This unique museum, 32 steps up a spiral stairway in the tower of St Thomas Church (1703), is the unlikely home of Britain's oldest surviving operating…
0.12 MILES
For a thousand years, a market has existed at the southern end of London Bridge, making this still-busy ancient gathering point a superb spectacle…
0.14 MILES
Puncturing the skies above London, the dramatic splinter-like form of the Shard has become an icon of the city and is one of the tallest buildings in…
0.17 MILES
This one-time private jail, known as the Liberty of the Clink, was used to detain debtors, prostitutes, thieves and numerous Protestants and Catholics…
0.2 MILES
This beautiful shopping arcade was an enclosed dock in the 19th century. The wharf handled all sorts of goods, although perishable foodstuff was the main…
8. Monument to the Great Fire of London
0.28 MILES
Designed by Christopher Wren, this immense Doric column of Portland stone is a reminder of the Great Fire of London in 1666, which destroyed 80% of the…