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I went 220 miles to Devon for 30 minutes – Tuesday.

I went 220 miles to Devon for 30 minutes – Tuesday.

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I got out of bed this morning and tried to encourage my legs to move and by the time I'd got down to breakfast they were just about usable again (but only just smilies ).

Breakfast is fairly late here, at eight o'clock, so I first wandered out into the town towards the church. It was very quiet as I passed through the back streets and emerged near the church.


The church is quite old with parts dating back to Saxon times. The interesting part is in the churchyard on the seaward edge.

That wire fence is to stop people from dropping off the edge of the cliff and you can see that the path shown goes nowhere. This church, when it was built, was a long way from the cliff now it can't be more than 50 feet. It is hoped that the new sea defences below will stop the erosion.

Back for breakfast then onward.

I'm going to hop on the same bus again this morning but I'll be going through Chideock to Burton Bradstock this time which is about a 60 minute journey.

I get off the bus just the other side of Burton Bradstock and walk down Beach Road. High tide was about an hour ago so the tide is going out and it's safe for me to walk along the beach as far as West Bay. I say 'safe' because there are high cliffs on my right all the way.

The cliffs, as you can see, are made up of alternating bands of hard and soft rock giving them a striped appearance. The rocks are Inferior Oolite and Fullers Earth from the Middle Jurassic.

As I walked along the beach I could hear a sound which might be described as a cross between a crack and a knock. This sound occurred regularly at intervals all the way to West Bay and was definitely coming from the cliffs. It sounded rather ominous but there were no rock falls whilst I was there. I can only assume that it was the hard bands expanding and contracting with changes in temperature.

These cliffs are dangerous and rock falls are not uncommon. This shows a recent fall and that crack in the cliff above doesn't look particularly safe. Staying away from the cliff, as I am, is the safest thing to do and needs to be done when the tide is going out so that more of the beach is exposed.

The hard rock bands are certainly fossiliferous as this picture of one of the fallen slabs shows. There are many molluscs and belemnites.

I continued along the beach towards West Bay until I reached the River Bride. That means I either paddle or go inland a little way to use the bridge.

I decided to do as the person in the picture did. The water at its deepest didn't reach my ankles nor was it particularly cold and to prove that I did get to the other side:

There are other people on the far side, who were behind me, preparing to do the same.

I finally reach West Bay which is the seaside part of Bridport.


The Bridport Arms used to be the Ship Inn and dates from the late 17th century and is partly thatched. The town of Bridport is a bit of a long walk from here so I decided to catch the bus which set me down in the town centre. The main roads in Bridport, West Street, East Street and South Street form a 'T' with South Street being the leg of the 'T'. This is from the top end of South Street looking south.

A short way down South Street is the town museum housed in this Tudor building.


Further down South Street is the parish church of St. Mary dating from the 13th century.

In the lower part of South Street is the Chantry; the oldest building in Bridport dating from before 1300.

Further on by the River Brit is Palmer's Brewery dating from 1794 and the water wheel, forged in 1879 at a Bridport foundry, does still turn.

From Easter to the end of October a guided tour starts at 11.00 am on every weekday (excluding Bank Holidays) and lasts for about two hours. No I didn't.

I made my way back up South Street to West Street where, after a tiring day, I caught the bus to Lyme Regis. Tomorrow I leave Lyme Regis. smilies

(Tomorrow, Wednesday: I leave for home – or do I?)

 

More of the same but more of the difference.

More of the same but more of the difference.

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A week ago I said we planned to return to Hampstead one day; well this is one day! Same place – different bits.

It all started so well. Today (Tuesday) was forecast to be this week's sunny day and, surprisingly, that is how it turned out; right to the very end. We went to Hampstead Station (Northern Line) via the tube and emerged into the sunlight.

We turned south along Heath Street (You can go north along Heath Street as well) and then right into Church Walk. A very pleasant street with lots of Georgian Houses. It turned out that this part of Hampstead was mainly Georgian so not very old at around 200 – 300 years.


And it wasn't called Church Walk for nothing you know.

It was a Georgian church and we didn't go inside as it was about to be invaded by a large party of what appeared to be visitors on a tour of Hampstead. We didn't see them again.

We turned right further along into Holly Walk which runs alongside a separate piece of ground used as the churchyard and you should notice a couple of large memorials just behind the railings in the next picture.

That lane led us up to Mount Vernon where we noticed this house together with another rather nice little lane called Holly Berry Lane. The plaque on the wall says:

"The Watch House – In the 1830s the newly formed Hampstead Police Force set out on its patrol & nightly watch from this house"

It was an arresting sight and so was looking back down Church Walk from the top.

There are plenty of nice little corners in this part of Hampstead and it is hilly.


One of the things we had planned to do on our next visit to Hampstead was to see two National Trust properties – 2 Willow Road and Fenton House. We discovered before we left home that they are both closed Mondays and Tuesdays and, of course, this weeks sunny day was Tuesday so we didn't even go near 2 Willow Road but Fenton House was in this area so we caught a glimpse of it behind its rather fancy gates. Next time perhaps?

We saw the Holly Bush Inn which is Georgian and a mere 200 years old. It did, however, have a menu posted outside and the various dishes did sound nice but it was too early for lunch so we passed by.

We were on top of a hill here and we wanted to head for Flask Walk and Well Walk which were on the other side of Hampstead High Street so we needed to head down the hill. From High Street we turned into Back Lane

which led us into Flask Walk. Flask Walk displays two distinct aspects. The top alleyway part with its shops and the lower part with its leafy residential aspect.


Why 'Flask' Walk? It recalls the centuries-old practice of Londoners climbing up to the two villages, Hampstead and Highgate, to fill leather flasks with pure spring water rather than risk the cholera-riddled infected waters of London.

On the way down Flask Walk we came across this building. Since many of the worker's homes in Victorian Hampstead had no running water, this public building provided both drinking water and facilities for bathing.

I don't need to tell you the date because it's on the building.

On our route we were going past Burgh House and Hampstead Museum and we thought we'd have a look round but, no, closed Mondays and Tuesdays. They seem to have a thing in Hampstead about closing on Mondays and Tuesdays but we did at least see the outside. It is, like a lot of Hampstead, Georgian.

We joined Well Walk and went past one of the original Chalybeate wells originally promoted for the medicinal value of the chalybeate waters (water impregnated with iron). Keats, the poet, and Constable, the painter, both lived in this area for a time.

We eventually joined East Heath Road on the edge of the 791 acres of Hampstead Heath. We were headed for one of the places we missed last time because we became lost on the heath and eventually ran out of time. So will we get lost this time? Of course not. *cough*

We started off along a well marked path in a wooded part of the heath.

We were looking for an obvious junction which we found and where we turned left arriving, eventually, at Viaduct Pond. See, I told you we wouldn't get lost.

The viaduct carries another path across the pond. We made our way up the side of the pond onto that very path then took a smaller path through the woods ahead and finally emerged onto a larger path. We knew where we were now so turned left and headed for our next destination. Just to be safe we asked some people coming from the opposite direction who told us that we were indeed going the wqrong way. Whoops! Lost again. If you do go to Hampstead Heath no matter how many maps you take you will get lost. It is a nice place to get lost though.

They did gives us some directions which we managed to follow and finally arrived on the path we wanted.

That's Amanda on the path and just ahead of her is a right turn which we need to take. This is what we were looking for.


It is Kenwood House run by English Heritage and, best of all, entry is free. They have a place for refreshments called the Brewhouse Cafe which is where we now repaired to have lunch. The food turned out to be very good. I had poached salmon with roast new potatoes and cous cous and Amanda had free-range pork sausages with apricot chutney and roast new potatoes. Can't you just picture those little sausages gambolling around in a big field? Lovely! The main courses were just £9.50 each. Good value.

There is also a very nice outdoor area where you can choose to eat your meal or refreshments if you so choose.

After lunch we went into the house which, you may remember, is free.

The original house dates from the early 17th century and the orangery was added in about 1700. In 1754 it was bought by William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield who commissioned Robert Adam to remodel it from 1764-1779. Adam added the library (one of his most famous interiors) to balance the orangery, and added the Ionic portico at the entrance. In 1793-6 George Saunders added two wings on the north side, and the offices and kitchen buildings and brewery (now the restaurant) to the side.

The house does not contain much furniture but it does have an extraordinary collection of paintings including a self-portrait by Rembrandt and paintings by Vermeer, Gainsborough and Landseer to name but a few.


The first picture above is the Library, added by Robert Adam, and the second picture is the Upper Hall with Amanda sitting at the table waiting for dinner. I didn't have the heart to tell her it probably wouldn't arrive.

Out in the grounds is this rather grand bridge.

Except it isn't anything of the sort. It's a fake. Just a wooden facade painted to look like a real bridge. The back looks quite different.

It was created around 200 years ago. Don't believe everything you see.

That was our Hampstead trip for the day but we had a little more time so we went, via the tube, to Lancaster Gate and into Hyde Park/Kensington Gardens. Just inside the gate is the Italian Gardens.

I was looking forward to photgraphing the fountains – but – no fountains. Sorry fountains are closed on Monday and Tuesday. I don't actually know if that is true but they definitely weren't running. Not one little drop. I don't know why but it was disappointing.

However there was something unusual.

No not the non-fountain but what's behind it. Oh! You can't see it? I'll move round a bit then.

Can you see the Heron perched on the edge of the bowl now? This one is obviously hoping for a fish dinner and, because it's so used to all the visitors, it hasn't taken fright as it would do normally and flown away.

So that was the end of our day – or was it?

We caught the Central Line to Liverpool Street Station for our train home except that there wasn't one. No trains running on the main line to Norwich. There were hundreds of people standing around on the main concourse all looking at the departures board. I've never seen so many 'Cancelled' and 'Delayed' indicators. Who do they think they are – an airport?

We had planned to get a train somewhere between 6:00 and 6:30. So much for planning.

We eventually learned that a train had damaged the overhead power lines which supply electricity to the trains motors and that this was just north of Chelmsford (one of the places our train goes through). This left just one track operating for trains going both ways so all trains were having to take turns to share this section.

Then just before 7:30 there was an announcement that a train was leaving for our neck of the woods but that induced a torrent of people and by the time we got to the train we would have needed a shoe horn to get in. We didn't bother.

Then, shortly after, another announcement said that a train going to Harwich International (north of our station) which wasn't going to stop at our station was having two additional stops which did include our station. We got to the train to find that there was room but only if we were prepared to stand. We had no idea how long we'd have to wait if we didn't get this one so we decided to take a chance.

It did actually leave on time, about 7:40, and we crawled for 30 minutes to the next stop. When we started again we picked up speed and we going quite well for some time until we stopped and waited – and waited – and waited. We must have waited there for about an hour then started a stop-start journey through various stations until we finally arrived at ours. After we'd been standing for 1 and a half hours two younger people offered us their seats and we collapsed into them before they changed their minds.

That journey took a total of 2 hours 45 minutes instead of the normal 55 minutes.

We were very glad to arrive home especially as it was 10:30. What an end to an otherwise nice day!

It’s Friday – so it must be Paddington to St. Pancras

It’s Friday – so it must be Paddington to St. Pancras

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Just over 4 weeks ago Amanda and I were planning a day trip to London as the weather forecast was good. However one evening about 5 days before that planned trip Amanda started to feel nauseous and then spent most of the night vomiting into a bucket by the bed followed by a bad cough the next day.

Nice! smilies

A day or so later we realised that Amanda wasn't going to be well enough for the day trip and discussed the idea of me going on my own.

However (yes, another 'however') a few days later I suddenly developed a bad cough too but without the vomiting. It was now patently obvious that neither of us would be well enough for the trip so it was postponed until another time. smilies

We both spent the next four weeks doing very little except sitting around feeling unwell which is why there has been nothing posted on the Blog. I still have a cough but am slowly beginning to feel better so I planned to meet Marie who had been staying on the Isle of Wight and was spending her last day in London before flying home the next day. I say 'I was' because Amanda still wasn't feeling well enough to tackle the trip to London. smilies

Marie and I were going to walk, along the Regents Canal, from Paddington Basin next to Paddington Station to St. Pancras Station.

I did manage to get myself out of bed at 6:15 AM and was on the train 3 hours later heading for Liverpool Street Station. Thirty minutes after arriving at Liverpool Street Station I was at Paddington and walked to Sussex Gardens, in the rain I might add, where Marie's hotel was.

Luckily the rain didn't last very long and we set off for Paddington Basin along Sussex Gardens and turned left into Sale Place. At the end of that was the entrance to Paddington Basin. We went in only to find that part of it had been drained for building works but a short walk along the basin soon left the building works behind and we were beside the water.

Out of the far end of Paddington Basin onto the canal and it's only a short walk to Little Venice. Having been here before on a sunny day I must say that it looks far more attractive in the sun than it did today under cloud.

If you want to see pictures of Little Venice then you can see that Blog post here or the web site pictures here.

We made our way through Little Venice onto the arm of the Regents Canal which took us, believe it or not, through Regents Park to Camden Lock and the markets with another rain shower on the way. In our blog post about our previous trip I wondered whether the market was alway seething or whether it was because it was a Saturday. This time it was a Friday and it was still seething.

One useful fact we discovered this time is that there are public toilets in the Market Hall building.

We had lunch here leaning on a rail overlooking the little canal basin in the market. Our choice was from a stall selling Caribbean food but the range of food here from different countries is nothing short of astonishing. We wandered past Camden Lock and down the canal path which went past the eastern arm of the market with yet more food stalls.

We were now on the home stretch from Camden to St. Pancras and as you can see the weather was slowly improving.

Marie was fascinated by the canal locks and stopped to take a photograph of this one.

Although this part of the canal wasn't especially picturesque it was interesting, just the same, with many different features along the way.

That path on the left is the one we are following and this photograph was taken from that path which should give you an idea of how it changed direction.

The final lock that we passed was St. Pancras Lock shown here with a narrowboat emerging.

Shortly after this we left the canal where York Way goes over it and found our way to Battlesbridge Basin.

This where you will find the London Canal Museum. That's the building between the two bow-ended buildings in the left half of the picture. It has a blue board with lettering in white.

From here we walked along York Way to Kings Cross with St. Pancras next to it. We were both pretty tired now, me especially, and Marie wanted to go to Seven Dials to do some shopping so we parted company in the Undergound at St. Pancras until our next meeting.

I need more exercise. smilies

Off the Wall and Mind the Gap

Off the Wall and Mind the Gap

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'Off the wall' is an expression used in the UK and, I believe, in the USA which means unusual or bizarre. In this particular case 'Off the wall' is on the wall! But I'm getting a little ahead of myself here so lets go back to the beginning shall we?

Yesterday, Wednesday, we hopped on a train once again and ended up at Liverpool Street Station in London emerging onto Bishopsgate at about 10:15 AM in sunny weather. The temperature was around 46 F which was a little cool but is pretty good for February. We could have been up to our knees in snow.

We were intending to spend the morning wandering the streets so a bit of sun is nice and not having to dress up like a couple of Arctic explorers was also nice. You can join us if you like.

Turn left along Bishopsgate, right into Middlesex Street ( used to be Petticoat Lane until the Victorians renamed it) then left into Wentworth Street where the Petticoat Lane Market is now held.

Down Wentworth Street to Brick Lane and turn left along Brick Lane.

It does feel, when wandering along Brick Lane, that this is part of Bangladesh and we did see a sign referring to the area as Banglatown. We also saw signs in what I belive may be Bengali.

Wanna buy a Saree? This is not really about the shop but the decoration on the boarding filling the window. Yes it's street art again.

If you take the trouble to look there's a lot of it about.

Some of it is fairly conventional.

But some of it is definitely 'off the wall'.

We couldn't leave without showing you this little chap. Well, maybe not so little.

I am given to understand that it is supposed to be a hedgehog. The general shape is about right but the poor thing's spines seem to be a bit sparse. The artist is known as 'Roa' and is from Belgium.

I took far more photographs than I could show here and we decided to stop at this point.

Right! Keep up! Don't lag behind or you'll miss the bus. We have a number 26 to catch. We didn't have to wait long and we were off to our next destination. On the way we saw this old shack, from the top deck of the bus, which you may recognise.

Then we made our way up Fleet Street.

Past the Temple Inns of Court and the Royal Courts of Justice.

Finally arriving at Aldwych where we get off the bus. Still with us? Good.

A short walk up Wellington Street, turn left along Tavistock Street, turn right into Tavistock Court and we're here – Covent Garden Market. Why are we here? Well that will have to wait for an hour or so because it's time for lunch and our intrepid travellers are famished.

Some time ago we visited Docklands and had lunch at a cafe called Henry's which we quite liked although they blotted their copybook by taking 30 minutes to bring our dessert. Remember? There is another branch of Henry's here in Covent Garden and we thought we'd see if they could do any better.

We arrived at about 1:10 PM so we expected it to be busy but they found us a table and left us to study the menu. We were on the same level as the street but there was a lower floor in a large well which gave us the impression that we were on a balcony. This was our view.

We gave our order for our main courses about 10 minutes after we arrived but it took about 20 minutes for them to arrive. I ordered a Chicken and King Prawn Jambalaya and Amanda ordered Blackened Chicken Breast & Avocado Salsa which were both very nice and quite filling. We both decided to have a dessert and I had a Sticky Toffee Glory which is described thus:

Fresh bananas, vanilla ice cream and broken meringue,smothered in toffee sauce.

I had that when we ate in their cafe at Docklands and I remarked at the time that although it was very tasty I could not detect any meringue so I decided to try again here and I have to say I could not detect any meringue in this one either. Perhaps the meringue is broken into such small pieces that it's undetectable but that would seem rather pointless.

We both did enjoy our lunch however and we would go there again but not if we were in a hurry as they are rather slow. If you have plenty of time we would recommend it especially as, for London, the prices are very reasonable. It cost us £44 for two including a tip.

Time to move on to our next destination and we had to walk only about 100 yards to here:

This building, so I understand, used to be the old Covent Garden Flower Market and is spread over three floors. On entering the people at the desk suggest starting on the top floor (there are lifts and stairs) and working downwards. I can see the logic in that as it means starting with the earliest transport and moving towards the present day.

The first area one encounters is this:

It certainly looks striking. The light grey ramp on the right is the way on to the main displays. This next picture gives an idea of the main space with galleries on each side. It certainly is big enough for a bus or two and some trains.

We started at the top where there are some examples of horse drawn buses and trams.

I suspect that those vehicles wouldn't provide as much comfort as we expect today.

The horse drawn trams don't look particulary luxurious and look rather similar to the horse drawn buses except that the trams run on rails and appear to be able to carry many more passengers.

We moved down to the floor below and forward in time to when underground trains started to run although these were hauled by steam locomotives.

You may notice that there is no cab on this locomitive so the driver and fireman had no shelter. They may not have needed it underground but there would be times when the train was running out in the open and in all weathers.

The old style carriages had separate compartments along the length of each coach with each compartment arranged across the coach with bench seats along each side. You can see, in the photograph below, that although we were prepared to 'mind the gap' there wasn't any gap!


If Amanda is waiting for the train to start she may be in for a long wait unlike this old buffer (notice the manic look in his eyes) who decided to try one of these individual shelters used during the second world war for people who would be working in the open, such as a railway yard, and not near a normal shelter when there was an air raid.

Then we get to the time when electric locomotives were introduced which didn't fill the tunnels with smoke.

The London Underground has been running for 150 years this year.

There were taxis, buses and trams in fact far too many vehicles to go through here and many more photographs will appear on the main web site in due course.

When we had finished looking around, and there is an astonishing amount to look at, we retired to the cafe for some refreshment. I had coffee but Amanda decided to have hot chocolate and this is what she had:

The cafe is situated above the shop and the shop is stocked with a wide range of London Transport items.

This is a really interesting museum and certainly worth a visit. It is run as a registered charity which is partly funded by donations from Transport for London but the rest must come from the general public. Your visit will help to support them and it will keep you happily amused for some time.

We finally decided that we'd had enough for one day and caught the No. 26 bus back to Liverpool Street Station and thence to home.

 

An elephant’s tentacles and some pickled moles.

An elephant’s tentacles and some pickled moles.

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On Tuesday the weather forecast for Wednesday was sun and clear skies up until lunchtime and then sunny intervals for the afternoon. Sunny intervals can be anything from one quick flash of sun in the whole afternoon to frequent sunny spells. However I planned to be indoors for most of the afternoon so that didn't matter. I decided to go.

Amanda wasn't coming this time because she had a dental appointment and wasn't particularly interested in some of the venues I was planning to visit.

When I left for the railway station I made allowances for some minor traffic hold-ups. There weren't any! So I arrived at the station much too early which, as it happened, turned out to be a boon.

When I went into the ticket office I discovered it was shut. The shutter was down and padlocked. Nothing to say why. I went around the corner to the automatic ticket vending machine to find an extraordinarily long queue. One look told me I'd be very lucky to get my ticket in time to catch the train.

I joined the queue which was moving very slowly and, as we got nearer my trains departure time, I heard an announcement over the station speaker system that said the train was running 10 minutes late so there was still hope. I did get my ticket and got onto the platform just in time to see the train appear in the distance which then pulled in a few minutes later.

Missing that train wouldn't have been a disaster but it would have chopped 30 minutes off my day.

I arrived at London Liverpool Street Station around 10:30 and went out into Bishopsgate and turned left. A little way along Bishopsgate I turned right into Middlesex Street. Middlesex Street, as you probably know, used to be called Petticoat Lane and the market there is still known as Petticoat Lane Market but the name was too much for the prudish Victorians who thought that streets shouldn't refer to undergarments and so changed it.

A short way along Middlesex Street I forked left along Widegate Street which brought me to one end of Artillery Passage; my first 'target' of the day. The sun is shining brightly off to the right but there isn't going to be much sunlight in this narrow passage.


I walked through and out into Artillery Lane, on to White's Row, across the busy Commercial Street and into Fashion Street. I was now in my next target area – Spitalfields/Shoreditch – and I was looking for 'Street Art'. This is becoming very popular with tourists looking for something different from the usual run of things and there are walking tours which go for the street art. I did come across one of these tour groups whilst I was walking around.

This was one of the artworks that I first saw.

I continued along Fashion Street and emerged into Brick Lane. I had heard that Brick Lane was known for its Curry Houses and I must admit that I have never seen so many Indian Restaurants in one street. Unfortunately I had also heard that most of them are overpriced and mediocre. I haven't been in to any of them so I cannot say if that is true or not.

Continuing north along Brick Lane I soon arrived at Hanbury Street and turning east into Hanbury Street I found this:

Someone has a vivid imagination.

I saw quite a varied selection of these artworks more of which will appear on the main web site in due course.

I went back into Brick Lane and crossed over into the western part of Hanbury Street which brought me to Spitalfields Market. We did visit Spitalfields Market on our last trip to this area but there were some large empty areas with hoarding around them. However, this time, there were lots more stalls.

You want stalls? We can do stalls!


After look round I made my way into Bishops Square and thence into Folgate Street to see Dennis Severs House at number 18.

Dennis Sever was an artist who lived in this house in much the same way as the original Huguenot occupants might have done in the early 18th century. It is not open every day so you should check their web site before you go. It wasn't open when I was there but then I hadn't intended to go inside.

I walked to the western end of Folgate Street and turned right towards Shoreditch High Street, which is effectively an extension of Bishopsgate, where I intended to catch a No. 8 bus to High Holborn near Tottenham Court Road underground station. I arrived after a 30 minute ride and headed south down Shaftesbury Avenue. After a short distance I reached a 3-way split. Fork left for Neal Street, fork right for Shaftesbury Avenue and the straight on, my intended route, for Monmouth Street.

This brought me, very quickly, to Seven Dials. I visited Seven Dials once before but was unable to take a good photograph of the monument because it was surrounded by hoarding as it was being cleaned. So I rectified that.

You should be able to see three of the seven roads that converge here and you should also be able to see the cloud appearing which now doesn't matter as I've done most of the exterior photographs that I had planned.

Now it's time for lunch so I walked off along the eastern part of Earlham Street towards Cucumber Alley. I was heading for the Euphorium Bakery in the basement of the Thomas Neal's Centre who provide sandwiches, cakes and hot and cold drinks in modern pleasant surroundings. I had a nice sandwich and coffee but certainly not cheap at £5 for the sandwich and £2 for the coffee.

Now that I was re-fortified I headed up Bloomsbury Street and then Gower Street just north of the British Museum. I was first planning to visit the Grant Museum of Zoology at the junction of Gower Street and University Street.

The Grant Museum of Zoology is the only remaining university zoological museum in London and houses around 67,000 specimens, covering the whole Animal Kingdom. The museum consists of just one large gallery.

There are numerous cases so most of the specimens are relatively small.This jar of pickled (preserved) moles illustrates the point.

Why would someone want a jar of preserved moles? Ah, well, I'm glad you asked that question because I can tell you the answer. As this is a teaching establishment it was the case that many years ago students had to learn dissection in order to observe how animals were constructed so numerous specimens of particular species were required. Hence the jar of moles that were never used for their intended purpose. I also remember seeing a similar jar of lizards.

Some of the specimens were, shall we say, a little bizarre.


However all of the specimens were interesting. Being a half-term holiday for schools it was obviously interesting for children.

Being fairly well preserved I thought I fitted in rather nicely. It was, however, time to move on to the Petrie Museum of Archaeology nearby. This museum houses an estimated 80,000 objects, making it one of the greatest collections of Egyptian and Sudanese archaeology in the world. It illustrates life in the Nile Valley from prehistory through the time of the pharaohs, the Ptolemaic, Roman and Coptic periods to the Islamic period.

 William Flinders Petrie (1853-1942) excavated literally dozens of sites and most of these specimens are the result of that work.

There are a number of galleries with many cases of artifacts.



One could be driven potty in here.

More pictures in this museum and of the Grant Museum will, eventually, appear on the main web site.

That was the end of what I thought was an interesting day and all I needed to do was to get myself home without incident. Yes I did manage that.

 

The view from Platform 1

The view from Platform 1

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It is true that when we travel to London by train we use platform 1 at our local railway station but that's not the one I'm talking about. We'll get to that later.

We decided to go to London on Wednesday but we weren't going to visit any, what might be called, 'meaty' sites but ones which would require only a relatively short visit. It turned out to be interesting nonetheless and I'm pleased that you have decided to join us on this trip.

We got off our local train at Stratford, as we do sometimes, and changed onto the Picadilly underground line which is the starting point of the line at this end and, consequently, the train was virtually empty when we got on. I don't think that I have ever seen an underground train this empty.

It didn't stay that way for long and eventually took us to London Bridge Station which is where we wanted to get off. London Bridge Station is, rather obviously, near London Bridge and just south of the River Thames but you didn't know that did you? There's no doubt that you'd get lost if you were on your own so you'd better stay close.

We left London Bridge underground station at the St. Thomas Street entrance and turned left to reach Borough High Street where we turned left again and, after a very short walk, we arrived at our first destination. This is the entrance, on Borough High Street, to the George pub courtyard.

Inside the courtyard we see the only remaining original galleried pub in London dating from the 1600s. There is another 'galleried pub' in St. Catherine's Dock near Tower Hill but that is a reconstruction and not a genuine original.

The timbers aren't very straight now are they? It is now only half the size it originally was as the Victorians demolished half of it to make way for new warehouses. Nice people!

We went back to St. Thomas Street a little past the underground station where we saw this view.

We were looking for a tower. No, no, no not that ghastly Shard thing at the back but the brick tower. Going through the doorway we see another small door over to the left which leads us up a small (very small) spiral stairway.

When we reach the top we are in the Old Operating Theatre and Herb Garret Museum. This was part of the old St. Thomas Hospital and is the oldest operating theatre in Europe. It is, oddly, found in the roof space of an English Baroque Church. It makes a little more sense when you realise that the wards of the old hospital were built around the church. The Operating Theatre would have been built in the first half of the 19th century when operations were still being carried out without anaesthetics.

The rest of the roof space was used by the St Thomas's Apothecary to store and cure herbs which is all they had in lieu of drugs.


There were a lot of displays relating to medecine and surgery of old including some of the old surgical instruments.

After having had a good look round we went back to Borough High Street and crossed the road to this archway.

Borough Market and Southwark Cathedral are immediate neighbours. There was a small outside market when we were there and although it looks as though the stalls are up against the cathedral they are not on cathedral property.


The covered part of the market is really quite spacious with lots of stalls some of which weren't open when we were there. Our only disappointment here was that it really was too early for lunch.

Traders in the 13th century started the market in Borough High Street although it was then closed by parliament in 1755. However a group of Southwark residents raised £6,000 to buy a patch of land known locally as The Triangle, once the churchyard of St Margaret's, and reopened the market. It has been going ever since and is renowned as a food market.

I should warn you that there are some funny people around.

I'm saying nothing.

We left Borough Market going past Southwark Cathedral and along Clink Street.

At the end of Clink Street we reached the Thames with the Golden Hinde nearby. Along the riverside past Southwark Bridge and the Millenium Bridge.

It wasn't long before we were in sight of the Blackfriars railway bridge. A few years ago it was decided that Blackfriars Station (the overground railway not the underground) needed an upgrade. The problem was that where could a new station be built in such a crowded area? The answer was, of course, that you build it across the river so that the station replaces the bridge and that is what happened.

You can probably see a small part of the road bridge through the nearest arch.

As one can use the normal overground railways in London with a travel card for travelling within the London Zones our travel cards let us through the barrier and into the station. We went up the stairs onto Platform 1.

We are walking from south to north and you'll notice that the railway lines are to our left and on the right instead of the usual wall there is a glass screen. This is the view from Platform 1 looking east through that screen.

Just out of the left of the picture we could see the dome of St. Paul's together with the top part of the two towers. The nearest bridge downriver is the Millenium Bridge but, unfortunately, it does tend to merge into the background.

We went out at the north end of Platform 1 and down into the Underground where we caught a train to South Kensington.

We went into the Victoria and Albert Museum just to have lunch. Amanda didn't enjoy hers as much as she did on the previous visit but mine was nice. Whilst we were sitting at the table I took this picture of the rather ornate Gamble Room in which we were having lunch.

After lunch we took a short cut out via the courtyard which today seemed more like the local swimming pool except that the water is only ankle deep but the children were certainly enjoying it.

We left the museum and headed north along Exhibition Road then turned left into Prince Consort Road. It wasn't long before we caught site of our next locatioon.

You may recognise it as the Albert Hall. Walking round one side of the building we came out opposite the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park/Kensington Gardens and I must say it was an astonishing site with all the gilding glowing in the sunlight.

We walked across Kensington Gardens towards the Round Pond and Kensington Palace. We had no intention of going into the palace but we did have a look at this.

The Sunken Garden in Kensington Palace grounds. The grounds, including this garden, seem to be freely accessible.

We were about ready now to head home so we aimed for Gloucester Road underground station, being the nearest, and we went via some of the backstreets.

Kensington is the sort of place where one sees roads lined with large, grand and very expensive properties.

This means that, as they were built in Victorian times, there would also be some mews nearby where the coach and horse were kept together with the coachman and his family.

So it proved to be.

That was a few of the mews we found and we were now worn out. I hope you enjoyed your trip – we certainly did and now it's time once again to go home.

 

Lynn – Day 4

Lynn – Day 4

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Today we wake to a cloudy sky. This does not come as a surprise as it was forecast and we still decide to stop off in Thetford on the way home as neither of us knows much about it. We finish breakfast, pack and set off.

We parked near the 18th century Nuns' Bridges which took their name from the nearby nunnery and they carry the ancient trackway known as the Icknield Way over the Little Ouse River and the River Thet in Thetford.

The first picture shows one of the bridges and the second picture shows the other two bridges; there being three in all and they are only one car width.


Not far the other side of the bridges we found the 17th century Dolphin Inn. A typically patterned frontage involving flints much used in Norfolk.

There were quite a lot of signs in Thetford but …

A bit further on and we found the old Medieval Motte and earthworks. This huge motte, or artificial mound, is sunk into a deep surrounding ditch, and protected on the north site by two sets of complex ramparts, which were probably part of the original Iron Age fortifications. At  64 feet high (72 feet from the base of the ditch) this is the second largest man-made mound in England the largest being Silbury Hill in Wiltshire. This would have had a castle on the top.

You can see Amanda wondering if we can actually get up there, the only way up is straight up the slope, will we get down alive?

Well we did and we are as this picture testifies. The building on the centre line of the picture is the back of the Dolphin Inn.

Further into the town we saw the Ancient House which dates from the late 15th century, making it Tudor, and it is now a museum.

Soon after we found the Charles Burell Museum which tells the story of a local factory which was once the major employer in the town making steam traction engines and steam rollers. I WANT ONE!

The company became known for producing reliable and good-looking steam-powered engines which were always built to customers' requirements.

Finally we went to see the remains of the Cluniac Priory.  Founded in the early 12th century these extensive remains were one of the most important East Anglian monasteries, the Cluniac Priory of Our Lady of Thetford and the burial place of the earls and dukes of Norfolk for 400 years.

Those parts remaining include the lower walls of the church and cloister, along with the impressive shell of the priors' lodging and, reached by a pathway from the main site, an almost complete 14th century gatehouse.



That was the end of our trip and, from there, we went home.