London UK 2014

We flew to the UK from Vancouver over night on Sunday 6 July and spent the first three nights in central London before traveling by train to Portsmouth.
The flight from Vancouver to London overnight on Sunday 6 July was uneventful, although at times seemed like traveling a bumpy gravel road, arriving Heathrow Airport about 11.30am and took a train into Waterloo Station.  Our accommodation was at Days Inn a short taxi ride away.  Walkable without luggage.  It was tourist season so people everywhere.  A growl y tooth, pacified by Disprin for the previous few days, had Raymond looking for a dentist early next morning, and one just across the street extracted the tooth the next day.

Cities are not our favorite places and we had previously done the walk around and Buckingham Palace so took the hop-on-hope off bus sitting on the top deck in the front seat. It was an excellent way to get a birds-eye view and someone else driving. As can be seen there is not much space on narrow streets.

Nor was there much room to walk yet people did so, and there were some worse than this one.  We chose to hire a taxi for the short trip to the train station.

The view of London from the Thames River is a good way to get a different perspective of the city both old and new so we joined the throng of tourists on one of the river boats to Greenwich.

There is still plenty of commercial traffic on the river.

And others parked up representing a bygone time.  This replica of the Golden Hind which is said to have sailed more distance than the original.

Another replica, this one the Globe Theater at which Shakespeare is played at it was originally intended without modern sound systems.

No visit to London is complete without a photo of the Tower of London which over its lifetime has served many purposes besides a prison.  It now houses the Crown Jewels.

Just to complete the historic buildings, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament.

Not all is old.  A new foot bridge for the Queens Golden Jubilee.  It was closed as soon as it was opened because it wobbled too much so was re-engineered and is now fully functional.  There was no mention of the designer being escorted to the Tower as may have happened a century or more ago.

There has been and continues to be considerable redevelopment of the old developments along the river for both commercial and residential use.  See further down comment about the cranes on top of the building to the right.

The most extravagant of all being the Shard.  Tallest building in Europe when built.

Most of these building are sheathed in glass which needs cleaning and maintenance to fittings.

The above work is made possible by giant cranes as permanent building equipment.

Riverside apartments are a feature, some new some conversions of old warehouses.

The financial hub of Europe now centered in the redeveloped docklands which are towards Grenwich. this view shows highrise office blocks behind riverside apartments.

Greenwich itself, further downstream, retains its old village atmosphere...

...including its time-ball that signals the time at 1pm every day. The official world time also remains fixed at Greenwich.

Flower pots abound and red telephone boxes have survived the cell phone.

However construction is happening but these chaps don't appear safety conscious hauling planks up with just a rope wrapped around them and the rope through a pully on the scaffolding. No hard hats and pedestrians walking past.

The Queen's House and park where the 2012 Olympic equestrian competitions where held.  Nothing remains of the structures and courses.  A complete level arena on piles was built over the grass area as has been done for the athletics field at the Glasgow Commonwealth games.

Some oddities.  Was this the Cutty Sark toilet?

What was holding what?

The boundary between Westminster and London (the London Square Mile).

How will they ever get these cranes down?  The same building appears in the photo of redevelopment earlier.

While interesting it was good to get out of London by train to Portsmouth.