London - Dec 2024
| Pre-Christmas trip to London | |
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Rob, Liz, and Hild were excited to find themselves on the train for a pre-Christmas
trip to London.
Alexis welcomed us into her home on Canary Wharf. We were greeted by our two feline hosts: one was very snuggly while the other was very elusive and hard to catch on camera. The beautiful Christmas tree was also Harry Potter themed, making us feel very much at home. |
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| Over the years we had heard many tales of the stunning view over the Thames River. Now we got to see it for ourselves. We quickly spotted the Shard skyscraper while lounging in Alexis' mum's favourite chair, now adopted by Liz as her favourite chair. | |
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| It became a game to spot the most noticeable buildings on the London skyline: The Shard, The Walkie-Talkie, and The Gherkin - all in one photo at sunset. | |
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| Looking in the other direction we spotted the Uber Boat zipping people up and down on the Thames. | |
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| Since part of our goal was to enjoy the Christmas lights, we headed out for a walk around Canary Wharf. There were many trees and bushes decorated for the season. | |
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| Sightseeing by speedboat is now our thing. In no time at all we travelled from Canary Wharf to Westminster Hall and Big Ben. We snapped photos of Tower Bridge, the Shard, the Walkie-Talkie, Shakespeare's Globe, London Eye, and many more and very blurry photos. | |
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We had a long day of walking ahead of us, so we zoomed past Big Ben and
headed down Parliament Street to catch literally a glimpse of Whitehall and Downing Street.
There was no sight of the Keir Starmer (Prime Minister) nor Rachel Reeves (Chancellor of the Exchequer)
who live there.
A short hop further along took us past another monument: The Women of World War II. We had not seen it before. It had been unveiled in July 2005 on the 60th anniversary of VE Day. The monument resembles a coat rack representing that women left their normal lives to take on any role necessary. |
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Our next stop was the Royal Horse Guards. The guard at the front gate were very
stylish but probably horribly bored. Bless them for standing still for so long.
The Household Cavalry Mounted Regiment consists of a squadron from each of the two senior Regiments of the British Army: The Life Guards wear red tunics and white plumed helmets, and The Blues and Royals wear blue tunics and red plumed helmets. We soon ran out of patience waiting for the Changing the King's Lief Guard, so we walked off towards Buckingham Palace. |
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| From the hustle and bustle of the Royal Horse Guards, we stepped into St. James's Park where we studied the birds we saw. We weren't really slowing down, but we snapped photos of giant pelicans, black and white swans, coots, Egyptian geese, cormorants, seagulls, and the hated-everywhere Canada Goose! | |
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| On our way to Buckingham Palace we also passed by The Guards Museum where they were wrapping up a parade. People were milling around outside the palace so we snapped some quick photos. The Queen Victoria Memorial and Canada Gate were shinier than in the past because of recent funeral and coronation. | |
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| Onwards we went with Green Park on one side and Buckingham Palace Garden on the other. We enjoyed walking through Wellington Arch before entering Hyde Park. The arch was named after 1st Duke of Wellington whose statue used to be on the top. Since 1912 the bronze statue is the Greek Goddess of Victory, Nike, riding a four-house chariot. It looks so life-link one sometimes worries that the horses will jump off! | |
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| Near the Wellington Arch we also studied an Australian war monument. Very captivating design where names of all the towns/cities where soldiers came from are printed in a pattern such that bigger words show the names of the battles. It reminds us of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington DC, which names all those service members who died or remain missing. | |
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| As we passed through the gates and entered Hyde Park, a cart drawn by two horses came trotting towards us. A poor footman was running flat out next to the horses. It turns out that he had to beat the horses to the arch so that he could open the gate for them. We wondered if he has to do this every day? Seems a remote control would be in order. | |
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| We detoured somewhat to also visit the very ornate Queen Elizabeth Gate. It is also known as the Queen Mother's Gate. It glimmers in the sun with its stainless-steel features of flowers. Thank you to Liz for knowing this was worth a stop. The gate was opened in 1993 marking the Queen Mother's 90th birthday and her love of flowers. | |
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| Since it was time for lunch, we dipped into Knightsbridge to see what we fancied to eat. We ended upstairs in The Bunch of Grapes on the corner of Brompton Road and Yeoman's Row. It was really yummy but we forgot to take photos. Rob particularly enjoyed his bubble and squeak. We did, however, catch photos of Harrods and its shop front famously decorated for Christmas. | |
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Our route next lead us past museums we will visit next time: Victoria and Albert Museum and the
Natural History Museum. Walking through the campus of Imperial College brought
memories back for Rob when he defended his PhD way back when.
As we did last time we walked through campus, we also enjoyed Royal Albert Hall now with a big Christmas tree. We are always somewhat amused by the casual posture of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, leaning against the wall. |
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| We wanted to visit the Albert Memorial again. It is so big and shiny and intricate one needs the notes to take it all in. | |
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The four arts are represented: poetry, painting, architecture and sculpture.
The four industrial arts and sciences: agriculture, commerce, engineering, and manufacturing. The eight sculptures represent the sciences: astronomy, chemistry, geometry, geology, rhetoric, medicine, philosophy, and physiology. The continents are represented: Africa, Asia, America and Europe. |
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Walking through Kensington Gardens we enjoyed the screeching of parakeets, which was weird!
Some it all started with some escaped pets and now there are a lot of them.
They were too fast for our cameras.
In stead we swung past the Peter Pan statue erected in 1912. |
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| After stopping for a cup of hot chocolate at the Italian Gardens Cafe in Kensington Gardens, we wandered off towards Marble Arch and Oxford Street to start enjoying the Christmas lights and decorations. However, we were a bit early and the lights hadn't been turned on yet. Walking around and buying a battery bank for Liz inched the clock beyond 4 pm and lights came on! Us and just about everybody else had come out to enjoy the lights. | |
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| Selfridges department store had put a lot of effort into their window displays. Some stylish and some colourful, but all fitting for the season. | |
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| John Lewis had splashed out with vertical lights along their entire building intermittently turning off and on to simulate snow falling. Very fancy! | |
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| We turned south on Regent Street finding it was also dressed nicely for the occasion. | |
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| The angel displays above Regent Street were beautiful and looked so good against the old buildings lining the street. | |
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Winding our way through Picadilly Circus we braved the increasing masses
and finally made our way to Trafalgar Square. We wanted to see what this year's
Christmas tree from Norway/Oslo looked like. It looks better in the dark because
you can't spot the missing branches. The tree commemorates the help London, and the UK
gave to Norway during the Second World War harbouring or King Haakon VII.
This year the tree is 20 metres tall and over 60 years old. It was cut down, wrapped up, and shipped all the way from Oslo. How good would anyone look after that treatment? |
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| We like to stop by Trafalgar Square any day - to look at the Canadian High Commission, greet Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson high up on his pedestal, and marvel at the four lions guarding the column. | |
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| The next day we completed another planned task: make kransekake together. We decorated it with Alexis' favourite take-away paper bags made into streamers, topped with a Canadian hockey-playing beaver, on a bed of Quality Street chocolates. | |
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| We also visited Greenwich to complete our touristy things. Taking the DLR (Light Rail) from Canary Wharf to Cutty Sark was perfect for us. The ship is big and hard to miss - and also impossible to fit into one photo! | |
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From the Royal Observatory we got a big view of the Old Royal Naval College
which stands on the Tudor Palace birthplace of King Henry the VIII (1491) as well as his
daughters Queen Mary I (1516) and Queen Elizabeth I (1533).
The tall buildings on Canary Wharf are hard to miss, and over to the right we could see the O2 Arena. |
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| On our way up the hill to the Royal Observatory we spotted the biggest ship in a bottle we have seen. It is a scaled-down replica of HMS Victory, which was Nelson's flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. | |
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At the Royal Observatory we snapped some photos of the buildings and the
fun measuring implements. What nerdy fun!:
1. The Time Ball is one of the World's first public time signals. Installed in 1833 it helped ships check their marine chronometers and navigate the Thames. It drops daily at 13:00. It is raised halfway up the mast at 12.55 as a preparatory signal and to the top two minutes before it drops. 2. The Shepherd 24-hour Gate Clock is one of the earlies electrical public clocks installed in 1852. The clock is accurate to half of a second. 3. Ordnance Survey Bench Mark G1692. This is used to keep track of the height above sea level. 4. Public Standards of Length. In 1859 these British Imperial Standards were mounted so the public could check their own length measures: A British yard, two feet, one foot, six inches, three inches. Since we had Alexis with her local knowledge, we chose not to pay GBP 24 to stand on the actual Prime Meridian and know you were on the actual Greenwich Mean Time. She knew of a spot in front of the building where the Meridian is still drawn. That's where we took our group photo! Sneaky. |
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| Before heading back home for the day, we stopped by Dark Sugars in Greenwich and had very decadent hot chocolates prepared very elaborately by their staff. He even instructed us when/how to record a movie of his work. | |
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To try something different, we decided to walk back to Canary Wharf. We had heard of a foot
tunnel under the Thames which had to be tried and then a stroll across the Isle of Dogs to get home.
The lift that took us down to the tunnel was wooden and rather rickety. The stairwell was wide and had many steps down. Even with Hild's claustrophobia it wasn't so bad. The tunnel was well-lit and there were many other people making the same journey. The narrowest part of the tunnel was a bit unnerving mainly because of the plaque describing bomb damage dating back to the Second World War. |
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Our walk across the Isle of Dogs was leisurely and we gathered some historical
knowledge on the way. The area grew through iron works to the support shipbuilding industry.
It then moved on to producing colours and chemicals. Now the area is largely residential.
There doesn't seem to be full agreement on why it is called "Isle of Dogs" but the most common story is that Henry VIII took his hunting dogs to the peninsula and sailors would hear all the barking. |
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| The houses range from derelict to beautiful. Charming and very red Ferry House claims to be the oldest pub on the island. | |
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| There are many fancy-looking apartments along the waterfront. We wouldn't mind living there - if we win the lottery one day. | |
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| In the evening we enjoyed a concert by candlelight in St Paul's Church in Covent Garden. It is also know as the Actor's Church. The quartet playing Christmas carols for us is called Icon Strings. It was beautiful and put us all in Christmas spirit. After the concert we explored the church which has many plaques honouring actors, composers, playwrights and so on. | |
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| On our way home we spotted Liverpool Football club busses pulling up to the hotel located in our building. Not being fans, we didn't try to get close for photos or autographs. | |
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| Our long weekend in London was a great success. We shared breakfast with Alexis before we jumped on the train to return home. | |
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Postscript: We were happy to have good walking shoes. No need for hiking boots or wellies. |
December 2024