Five Things to Know About Flying to London from Yakima

Maybe you grew up fantasizing about London or you wanted to see some real castles or maybe you just love British programming. There are plenty of reasons to visit London. Traveling there isn't as difficult or even as expensive as you might think, but there are a few things you should know before flying there from Yakima.

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You'll need both a passport and, now, a UK travel visa.

First and foremost, you'll need a passport. You can get a passport in Yakima at the post office on 3rd and Washington. It's easy to set up an appointment in advance that tells you which items you need to bring. Your Real ID isn't good enough for this overseas trip.

If you already have a passport you'll also need a travel visa. This is new as of about a year ago. Go to the official UK ETA website from the government. Not one that looks like it, or one that offers a cheaper offer as those may not work. Easiest to download the official app, enter your information and pay a small fee. I was verified in a matter of minutes and it basically downloads into your passport (your passport has a chip in it to recognize)

Yakima's airport YKM and even PSC aren't near as stressful as SEA.
Like many flights where everyone just kind of jumps up and crowds the boarding gate, you may see these lines. Don't worry about them. They'll still call by boarding group so it doesn't matter if you're standing in line or not.

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Your US credit card works there without needing cash

In fact, many places are going cashless as it is. Many credit cards will work without needing to call in advance to let them know you're traveling and, best of all, it will convert it for you. If something is 30 pounds, that's about $40 so whatever it says, just know you're paying a little more than that. One less thing to worry about.

Your same Uber app works in the UK

If riding the double-decker bus isn't your thing and the underground subway system (tube) is too confusing for you, you can always Uber. Same app that's already on your phone works just as well. That also goes for Uber Eats.

If you're in London, be ready to walk

London, as with most of the UK, was built in a time before cars so they streets aren't exactly wide for convenient travel. If you're looking to do some sight-seeing, easy to just find yourself near a monument like Big Ben or Tower of London then just walk from there. Fortunately, there is plenty to see in any block radius in a place like downtown London so you're not far from a lot.

And, worst case, you can take the tube to another place. Plenty of YouTube travel videos say you can get a card that works all day and all that, but if you don't wanna mess with that, easily enough, just scan your credit card on the way in, take it anywhere, and scan it on the way out. It'll calculate the distance from when you scanned in and out and charge that much.

Plenty of options to fly to London. I hope you get the chance to experience it sometime soon.