Tuesday, December 18, 2018

Greatest city in the world?


Delightful trip to London last weekend, spent two days and a night in town with some good friends, just hanging out and taking in the festive vibe so unique to what is, in my estimation, one of the greatest cities in the world, perhaps the greatest? We went to a restaurant on the Saturday night that overlooked one of the towers of tower bridge, see picture above, it doesn't come out that well in this shot but if you look in the centre of the photo you can just about make out the wire supports that hold the deck of the bridge up, the large illuminated shadowy hulk above is one of the towers. For reference, below is the exact same view taken during the day.


We were staying near London Bridge and Borough market, a great place to visit any time of the year but especially vibrant at Christmas/New Year, the pubs, restaurants and wine-bars were heaving with people out enjoying themselves and the variety of produce (especially cheese?) on offer in the market was as fabulous as ever. In the picture below you can see a quick snapshot of market life (including one of my favourite stalls selling craft beer - Utobeer), this was taken on Sunday so it was a bit quieter than the day before when you could hardly move for crowds.


Of course no trip to London would be complete without a visit to one of the famous museums there. This trip we decided to divide our forces, the girls went to the V&A and the boys went to the Imperial War Museum. I hadn't been there in many, many years (probably since I was a schoolboy) and it has certainly moved on a bit from what I remember. We only managed to visit about 30% of the exhibits in the couple of hours that we had but it's one I'd like to return to another day, absolutely fascinating. Here's a picture of the main hall with one of the famous German "buzz bombs" that attacked the city during WW2, centre picture. 


We do enjoy visiting London, as Samuel Johnson once said, "when a man is tired of London he is tired of life".


No comments: