Festival Pier is a semi-misleading name, since the real festival begins on the boat! This is the loading space for a lot of the tourist and chartered boats around London. It’s a little tricky to find. My cab driver dropped me off at the Festival Hall and told me it was around the back. Sure enough, as I walked around the building, a big blue archway was waiting for me. Once I got there, easy enough to get on the boat. The pier has great staff to point me in the right direction to which boat was mine and then I was off sailing. On, off, easy as that.