Lake Havasu City, Arizona - London Bridge

Lake Havasu City, Arizona - London Bridge

The real bridge from England, and the fake, deteriorating, Merry-Olde-Village that was built next to it. Roadsideamerica.com Report...

Lake Havasu City, Arizona - London Bridge

This area hasn't changed much in the past three years that we've visited. The fountain has never worked, the phone booth has a plywood back wall, and the store-fronts look more like movie set props. Every year, we stand our daughter inside the phone booth and take her picture to see how much she's grown.

The flags and wrought-iron gates are in excellent condition. The double-decker bus must have been removed before we visited because we've never seen it.

The bridge itself is in great condition. You can still see many of the numbered bricks from the rebuilding of the bridge. The underside of the bridge is covered in swallows' nests. There are lots of things to do under the bridge along the waterway, from eateries to souvenir shops. One of the shops even sells bird food for a quarter a cup. You can use this food to do your own rendition of the movie, "Birds", by just walking under the bridge and showing the pigeons. At the top of the bridge sits the visitors center. You can purchase pieces of the bridge for $1.00 there and find lots of other fun local attractions.

Don't forget to take a water taxi ride while your visiting the bridge. [Deborah, 07/28/2009]

Lake Havasu City, Arizona - London Bridge

As a person who lives in Lake Havasu, I am as upset as many of the tourists who visit this town. Having grown up here it is tough to see how the once lively English Village has fallen into disrepair. After working at the London Arms Pub and Playhouse from open to its closing (forced closing), I greatly miss those times when it really was a tourist attraction. So I would like to fix it.

If someone is willing to give me 10 million dollars I'm sure I could make it even better than it once was. And to those of you who are still visiting, I'm sorry -- we know it's lame. [Alicia, 05/13/2008]

Lake Havasu City, Arizona - London Bridge

I was recently at London Bridge, and the tourist area near the bridge is very run down. There is a large faux-Tudor building that had been the location of a number of British-themed shops. The building is now empty. There are a handful of shops, but they sell mostly generic (and tacky) "tourist souvenir" items. It's rather sad to see the area fall so much since it first opened. [Steven F. Scharff, 11/23/2006]

Lake Havasu City, Arizona - London Bridge

The original London Bridge from the song "London Bridge is Falling Down." Was dismantled in England, shipped, then trucked to Lake Havasu City Az, and reconstructed piece by piece. There is a lake in Lake Havasu, but no place for the bridge to span water, so the man who bought the bridge, Robert McCullochm had a channel dredged which changed the flow of the lake. And he hired CV Wood, the man who designed Disneyland's layout, to lay out the streets of Lake Havasu City. Which many liken to dumping a bowl of spaghetti on a table top, and that's why so many of the streets wind around and that we have only two streets that run completely straight. [Keri Jones, 06/01/2004]

[RA: Bob McCulloch (the same mastermind who brought the World's Tallest Fountain to Fountain Hills, Arizona) paid $2.46 million for the bridge and another $5 or $6 million to transport it. Rededicated here in 1969. Here's an old slide of the 6-ft. tall Hinged Man^TM lurking on London Bridge in Lake Havasu City.]