We chose this bus tour after careful consideration of several competitors, I believe we made the correct choice. The Buses were very regular and all the different drivers were very helpful, and friendly. Each bus has earphones in little black bags available just by the driver on entering the bus, plug these in on the back of the seat in front of you and you can listen the guided tour. Although if you can ensure you wait for the Live tour guide (every second Bus) these seem much more informed and there is a better interaction obviously.
This tour offered the free Themes cruise included in the ticket price and the real benefit compared to other operators is you can keep using the cruise ticket more than once if this was your preference. But be aware that, you can also board the Themes cruise from underneath the London Eye, just down from Sea Life. This is not shown on the Original Tour bus Map, and this will save a lot of walking from one side of the themes to the other. Basically if you get on at the Westminster Pier the Boat then crosses the themes and also collects passengers from below the London Eye.
When you arrive at Tower pier, if you intend to return immediately then be inside the boat and close to the doors to ensure a quick exit, simply walk across and board the return ferry, we were split as a family as the boat rule is if you are outside on the outer area you must walk to the back of the boat to then re join the back of the cue inside. Unfortunately we missed our return ferry because of this exact situation.
Only one slight issue, you feel conscious that you may run out of time to complete your return journey on the bus, I feel they finish too early at 1800pm as this really does curtail your plans for a evening meal, especially if you are in central London and need the bus to return you to Paddington for example.
Also the Purple Run from Paddington has rather a long walk to connect to the Blue run, which would seem to be quite easy to resolved I they really wanted to look into it.
All in all a very good service and very informative, if you get a live guide on the bus. Avoid the pitfalls and you will definitely enjoy this Tour Company.
