Wednesday 28 August 2013

London - Tuesday 27 August

Yes, Murphy was an optimist. if anything can go wrong it will. If more than one thing can go wrong the most problematic will.

By 4 o'clock I gave up my pretence of sleeping and got up and did some swimming stuff. Trevor said later that he had been awake from the time I got up. Perhaps he had been but I would argue that he sounded very much asleep.

Just after 6, having showered and dressed, we headed out expecting to be able to find places serving breakfast. Yes, there were places open in the Euston Station area if all you wanted was coffee and pastries. We walked around until 6:30 when a place serving real breakfasts opened.

Suitably refreshed we returned to the hotel.

I have frequently carried my portable Cannon printer with me when I have traveled. To date I have had no problems with it. It was working last week when I checked it out but alas not this morning. Bother! I had not printed out the details of the people I intended to research today. In teh end I figured that I would just have to work from Thingy if I needed to reference anything.

Trevor finally left. He was going to the Victoria and Albert museum hoping to revisit the textile collection that had so fascinated him in 1981. depending how long that took he had a number of other things to do.

In the meantime, having given up on the printer, I checked my emails and got ready to leave. The first problem was that I could not find either of the London maps that I had purchased. In the end I concluded, correctly, that Trevor had obviously taken both with him. Given taht I was walking to the various places I had on my listed I figured that it was easier to pick up another street directory than stress out any further about the missing ones.

I planned to start at the London Metropolitan Archives. As I didn't have a readers ticket I needed to take two bits of ID along. Simple. Drivers licence, which also provides address details, and my passport. Passport? What had happened to my passport? I had had it on Monday but could I find it? I seached through my bags multiple time, as well as through the items that were scattered around our room, to no avail. The level of panic was starting to rise. lost passports when you are away from home are a real problem. Finally I decided to search through Trevor's bags and, much to my relief, there it was. The seaching had taken the best part of an hour so I was much later leaving than intended.

I finally got to the Archives and got my ticket, actually a photo id card, only to discover that the records I had been intending to search through have now been digitised and are available on Ancestry.com. I could have done the search from home! The mariner records held at the LMA are too late for my needs. I could locate the probate documents that I was after and the marriage licence did not come up in any of the searches.

In the end, feeling tired and frustrated, I decided to give further reseach at LMA a miss and headed out into sunshine.

I sopped for lunch at Exmouth Market. The place was packed with people strolling along this pedestrian thoroughfare, obviously enjoying the fine day. The outside tables were well patronised, too.


I had decided to head over the the Society of Genealogists however, by the time if got there, I just was not in the mood to do any research so continued my walk. I had spied St Paul's ahead of me and decided to refresh my memory of this iconic building. The gardens surrounding St Paul's were full of people both in the sun and the shade.

Enjoying the sun in the gardens of St Pauls

Some of the crowd who were sitting on the front steps of St Pauls

The vista of this wonderful building is limited by nearby buildings


Leaving St Paul's I walked across the Millennium bridge.This is a footbridge across the Thames and it was crowded with people.



I am feeling really tired so will complete this post tomorrow.

... and here is the continuation.

I walked along the river and was amazed at just how many cranes were visible on the top of some very tall buildings under construction. The wholer skyline of London has changed dramatically over the past 30 years. I crossed back to the other side of the river walking over Southwalk Bridge.

A view from the Millennium Bridge

And what is this building?
Look at the cranes as seen from Southwalk Bridge

and yet more cranes!
This next photo is for Anto. Cycle Surgery ... the mind boggles.


Yes, it was a bike shop.

There is a surprising number of people who ride around the streets on bikes. There are also frequent bike hire points, too.

I wended my way back to Euston. Trevor was already back. He had started at the Victotia and Albert Museum, which was very quiet and disappointing as the frabics that he had planned to look at are no longer on display. He then went on to the Natural History Museum which was crowded. It is the last week of the summer school holidays and everyone is out with their children having a last minute fling before returning to school. The queues at the National History Museum were very long as a consequence. From the National History Museum Trevor went on to Regent Park. Here are some of his photos.




... and what bird is this?







Let me know if you work out what this bird is.


1 comment:

  1. Lucky you found the passport..... there seems to be a habit of losing them at the moment! You'll be pleased to know it's sunny here this week and generally beautiful weather. Astrid tells me that you are 'in England' every day but then asks when you are coming over to walk the alpacas!

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