Everything You Need to Know About the Tower Bridge Tour, London

Discover the stories behind the iconic London landmark

Tower Bridge. Easily one of London’s most iconic landmarks, an rightly so. The towers on the Thames are things of beauty. Beyond the views, Tower Bridge is keeper of some fascinating history and by taking a Tower Bridge tour, you can step into it.

Taking the Tower Bridge Tour lets you step inside the famous towers, discover the history and hear the stories of the people who kept it running.

I recently took this tour and this is my guide: what to expect, a few things I wish I’d known before I started and a bonus tip about where to go to get a good shot of Tower Bridge once you’ve been inside.

What to Expect on the Tower Bridge Tour

Starting with the actual tour, because it’s brilliant. I arrived to Tower Bridge from London Bridge station and as we walked along the river looking up at those two towers, I was excited at the thought of going into them. Tower Bridge did not disappoint.

The experience is broken down into three main parts: The Towers and the glass walkways, the Blue Line and the Victorian Engine Rooms.

Tower Bridge Tour: The Towers

The tour begins on the bridge itself before climbing the 206 steps up the first of the towers. Tower Bridge was built by the Victorians, who had a wonderful practice of making things both functional and beautiful.

The sweeping staircases and ornate windows give the tower interior a castle like feel. Panels on the walls and exhibits at the landings explain how Tower Bridge was built; this beautiful London landmark was born from sheer grit and hard graft.

To really get a feel for this, spend some time at the exhibition about the bridge divers. They dug out the foundations for the bridge, digging into the bed of the Thames with bare hands. Oxygen was provided by someone operating a hand pump from a boat up on the surface.

The little cat that pops up across the tour as mascot for the Tower Bridge children’s trail. A very sweet way to make the bridge fun for all ages.

At the South Tower look up to see the Riveters statues, a tribute to the skilled workers who built the towers. They were mostly local men who worked in gangs. Although the work was hard and dangerous they were relatively well paid.

The Walkways

This is what a lot of visitors come for, and as a result the most crowded part of the tour. I can see why, the views up and down the River Thames are fantastic. To minimise the crowds and have any chance of a solo photo, I’d definitely look to book first entry or last. If not, it looks a bit like this.

The views take in modern landmarks like The Shard, the Sky Garden and warship HMS Belfast.

Views from the East Walkway are more old London; historic docks like Butlers Wharf and Canary Wharf and onwards towards Greenwich and Woolwich. From the West Walkway you have a grand view down the river to the five City of London bridges.

Beneath your feet, the glass walkways. It’s a slightly surreal experience at first looking down and stepping onto them. Great fun though, and a different look at the Thames.

The glass floor on the West Walkway comes complete with a mirrored ceiling for a fun photo opportunity, as long as you don’t mind grabbing your photographs alongside everybody else.

Tower Bridge Tour: The Blue Line

As you leave the South Tower, the next part of the tour involves following The Blue Line. Painted onto the pavement to join up a series of brass plaques featuring either a name or an ornamental design, the Blue Line is designed to celebrate the people of Tower Bridge.

The names on the plaques are all former bridge workers. Nice to see some women featured, including Hannah Griggs, a cook whose story is explored a little more in the Engine Room exhibit.

Hannah was born in Bermondsey to a single mother and went into service when she was 13. She became a cook and took a job at Tower Bridge in 1911. Hannah went on to marry a train driver and left Tower Bridge when she started a family in 1915. She died aged 58.

I hope she had a happy life, I enjoyed ‘meeting’ her through the Blue Line. People make places, don’t they?

I’d really recommend taking a bit of time to experience this part of the tour. I noticed a lot of people rushing past. I think that’s a shame.

Tower Bridge Tour: The Engine Rooms

The final part of the tour takes you into the depths of Tower Bridge, the Victorian engine rooms. The boiler rooms, pumping engines and accumulators are clever stuff and interesting. If a bit beyond me, I’m not at all technical.

Even the most whimsical of us can appreciate the genius that allowed the Victorians to shovel coal in at one end and lift the bridge at the other though, can’t we?

The Self Guided Highlights Tour

A standard ticket gains you entry to Tower Bridge for the self guided tour. The exhibitions around Tower Bridge make for a great experience, but if you want to go a little more in-depth, there is a free Highlights tour available via Smartify.

I found it hard to listen to the tour as I went round, it’s better listened to before or after. It is worth a listen though, especially as it features several contributions by staff from the bridge. They know their stuff and tell it well.

The Tower Bridge Bus Jump

There’s a lot of facts and history revealed across the tour, but I could not resist sharing this one. On the 30th December in 1952, the No. 78 bus was crossing the bridge. Driver Albert Gunter didn’t realise Tower Bridge was opening until he was crossing, forcing him to jump the gap.

Quite the stunt, but he pulled it off and was rewarded with £10, a day off work and bragging rights for life.

Tickets & Admission

Pre-booking tickets strongly advised.

Ticket prices for admission with a self guided tour are £16 adult/ £8 child. Concession and family tickets available. Unfortunately, there’s no family ticket for two adults or a single adult with a child.

It is also possible to book a behind-the-scenes guided tour that includes access to areas not included on a standard tour, but these tours are quite spendy- £80 per adult- so you’d have to be pretty keen.

Personally, I found the self guided tour to be enough. Very informative and good fun.

Is the Tower Bridge Tour Worth It?

I’m saying yes. I enjoyed the tour and the views from the walkways are are fantastic. Looking down on London life from 42m above the Thames is fun and tickets are reasonably priced.

The only downside is that actually getting into the Tower Bridge tour is chaotic. I might not have helped myself by booking a mid-afternoon entry time, but on arrival there was no clear queuing system. Not helped by the fact that all signs refer to ‘groups’. I didn’t think I was in a group having booked two single tickets. Turns out your group is everyone on the same entry time as you.

Also worth noting that when waiting to go in, you wait on the bridge itself. There’s no cover and your sort of parked between the Tower Bridge traffic on one side and the flow of pedestrians on the other.

A great experience, worth the ticket price, just be prepared for the chaos of getting in.

Tower Bridge is Dog Friendly

It surprised me but it’s true- Tower Bridge is a dog friendly London location!

Not my dog, Little Wolf isn’t friendly enough to strangers and would not enjoy the busy environment. But I still thought this worth including. If you have a smaller, city friendly dog then they are welcome across the tour.

Tower Bridge Views

So once you’ve been up and gotten the views from Tower Bridge, you might want a nice shot of Tower Bridge. You’ll get some nice pictures from many points along the river, but it will be very busy so here’s a little tip to help you get a lovely and people free view.

From the Tower Bridge Engine Rooms and gift shop, walk onto Shad Thames. Find the little alleyway called, ‘Maggie Blakes Cause’. You could easily miss it- look out for the blue posts either side.

Walk down this little alley way to the riverfront for a clear, across the water view of Tower Bridge.

Shad Thames is a lovely London street, full of history and character with loads of places to eat and drink . Tower Bridge doesn’t have a cafe so this is a great option to round off off your tour.

And that makes this a great place to round off this post. If you’re looking for more London inspiration, I’d love you to read one of these posts next:

Battersea Power Station & Lift 109 Experience

Exploring London for FREE: 6 Things to Do Without Spending

The George Inn: A Unique Historic London Pub Owned by The National Trust

Helen x