Our First Full Day in London
After a couple of brief awakenings during the night, we woke up at about 9:30; it may be another couple of nights before our sleep patterns iron out. We were too late to catch the breakfast at the Euro anyway, (it ended at 9:30), so we took our time getting up. We eventually showered and got ready for the day.
We went out to Marchmont Street in search of breakfast and chose the Valenica Café on the corner of Marchmont and Tavistock Place. We each had an *enormous* Full English Breakfast (ahhh…. I just love that Full English). It was a lot of food but we knew it would stay with us for most of the day. Quite reasonably priced too.
After breakfast at the Valencia, we returned to the hotel, gathered our stuff for the day and set out for a visit to Leadenhall Market. On the way, we briefly visited the piazza at the British Library for a quick look around (there’ll be more on the British Library later in the blog):
In the City of London
The City of London (also known as “The City”), is the oldest section of London, which contains the historic financial district. It is home to the Stock Exchange and Bank of England. “The City” is a city within a city; it contains the ancient centre and the central business district of London.
To get to The City today, we boarded the Underground at King’s Cross, and got off at Bank station. We wandered around The City and, quite by accident, encountered The Monument to the Great Fire of London:
From the Monument we slowly made our way in the direction of the Thames. On our way we passed by The Parish Church of St. Magnus The Martyr. We would have liked to take a look inside this majestic-looking structure, but unfortunately it was closed at the time (it was lunch hour), so we never did see the interior:
From there we wandered down to the Thames. We could see the famous Shard on the other side of the river. The Shard is a pyramid-shaped 72-storey mixed-use skyscraper, designed by the Italian architect Renzo Piano. It is currently the tallest building in the United Kingdom:
From the Thames we wandered back up the City a bit and explored the beautiful Leadenhall Market. It’s no small wonder scenes from some of the earlier Harry Potter movies were shot here:
Behind Leadenhall Market is the futuristic-looking Lloyds Building (sometimes known as the Inside-Out Building). This unique structure is the home of the insurance institution Lloyd’s of London. The building is a leading example of radical Bowellism architecture in which the services for the building, such as ducts and lifts, are located on the exterior to maximize space in the interior:
Leaving behind the radical architecture, we paid a visit to the more traditional: St. Michael, Cornhill. St Michael, Cornhill, is a medieval parish church in the City of London with a pre-Norman Conquest parochial foundation, lying in the ward of Cornhill. The medieval structure was lost in the Great Fire of London (1666), and replaced by the present building, traditionally attributed to Sir Christopher Wren. In the church, one of the Church Watchers guided us through the building and filled us in on its history. They had some aged but beautiful floor tiles there:
Leaving St. Michael, Cornhill, we went to the Royal Exchange, which acts as a centre of commerce for the City of London. We had a pit stop at Starbucks as were getting a little tired and in need of respite.
From Starbucks we went to St. Dunstan’s-in-the-East and toured there. St. Dunstan-in-the-East was a Church of England parish church on St Dunstan’s Hill, halfway between London Bridge and the Tower of London in the City of London. The church was largely destroyed in the Second World War and the roofless ruins are now a public garden maintained by the City of London Corporation:
Leaving St. Dunstan’s, we thought we’d slowly make our way to the Underground (Tower Hill station) to get back to the hotel. On the way, we stopped into “the oldest church in the City of London”: All Hallows by the Tower:
We returned to the Thames as I wanted to get a few more shots of Tower Bridge. We happened to be in time to see the bascules (cantilevers) open and close on Tower Bridge to allow a tall ship to pass through the bridge. Here’s the video:
It started to rain in earnest, so we opted to return to our hotel. We found the Tower Hill Underground station and went back to King’s Cross station, reaching our hotel at about 4:30. We were both quite tired (jet lag still sort of with us), so we each had a little nap.
Evening
Waking up at about 6:00PM we realized it was time for dinner. We decided to eat somewhere close to the hotel, so we chose Leon in the Brunswick Centre – it was simple fare but absolutely delicious!
We returned to the Euro Hotel at about 7:45, where we read, relaxed and got caught up on this journal. Off to bed at about 9:30.
And… that was our first full day in London!! Stay tuned for much more to come.
Today’s step count: 15,842
Ahhh – you are bringing back such memories for me . We went to St Magnus the Martyr (it was open). Did you see the piece of old Roman dock outside the church. And, I loved St Dunstan in the East. Leadenhall was on our list – but no time, so it is great to see your photos.
So glad you enjoyed the Leadenhall shots – it’s a remarkable place isn’t it!? So beautiful. Interesting you should ask about the old Roman dock at St. Magnus the Martyr – yes, we noticed that… very interesting indeed. The old City of London is a fascinating place. I’m hoping to return there some day to continue exploring.