London, United Kingdom´s capital and largest city and one of the largest cities in the world. It is also a world known very old historic metropolis, founded as Londinium over 2000 years ago by the Romans. The wide river Thames is flowing through the city. We visited
London in April 1999 for 5 days and for a week
in May 2005, as well as for 4.5 days in April 2022. Since the last visit, London has changed a lot! London still has the classic tourist attractions like Big Ben, The Tower of London, Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus, Oxford Street, St Paul's Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and so on. But London now also has the London Eye (ferris wheel), The Shard (Europe's tallest building upon completion), Sky Garden (a futuristic tropical garden on the 38th floor of the "Walkie-Talkie" Bldg), a new viewing terrace on top of the new shopping mall One New Change and lots of other new buildings. Big Ben, part of the Houses of Parliament, has been recently renovated in it's grandeur, facing the Thames.
Since the last visit, London is not in the EU any more, but it is still as busy as before and there are a lots of construction sites. Since being a typical European lowrise city in the past with just a few skyscrapers in the entire city, with the 47-storey Tower 42 from 1980 dominating the skyline for decades, had changed a bit during the visit in 2006 with the iconic egg shaped 30 St Mary Axe, and the then tallest building, One Canada Square in Canary Wharf surrounded by more skyscrapers. But in 2022 there was a whole new CBD (financial district) in the East part of central London, where 22 Bishopsgate now is the tallest (278m), with many skyscrapers built close to each other, like Leadenhall Bldg and Heron Tower, and since 2013 The Shard is UK:s tallest building and taller then the Eiffel Tower (310m), standing in a pyramide glass hape on the opposite side of the river Thames. In the futuristic Canary Wharf, part of the harbour redevelopment Docklands in the East part of London, there are now three times as many skyscrapers and it is much more lively with shopping malls, promenades, sculptures and canals. Isle of Dogs and Wood Wharf are also skyscraper districts in Docklands. In Vauxhall new and impressive skyscrapers are facing the Thames. In Greenwich you find the huge futuristic Millennium Dome (now the O2 Arena and entertainment venue), Greenwich Market, the historic ship Cutty Shark, nice views of Docklands, Queens House, The Old Royal Naval College and last but not least the Greenwich Meridian Time (GMT) in Greenwich Park where all time zones are measured from.
Since the Summer Olympics were held in 2012, Stratford in Northest London has changed to a very modern district with skyscrapers and futuristic sports arenas, since it was the offical Olympic village, as well as London's largest shopping mall, Westfield Stratford City.
London is a major shopping destination with big department stores like Harrod's Knightsbridge (that claim to be the leading store in the world), Selfridge's, Fortnum & Mason and Marks & Spencer. Major shopping streets are Regent Steet, Oxford Street, Carnaby Street and King's Road that are really busy.
Kensington, that includes South Kensington and Earl's Court is a district with a more classical London approach. Many hotels arre situated there, as well as the Natural History Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Chelsea is another traditional district. Camden Town is a vibrant and colourful neighbourhood with many punks, goths, immigrants and unusual stores. Brixton is a classic but more gritty and very livley neighourhood, home to the colourful Brixton Market and Brixton Arcade, home to many people from West India and Colombia.
London has many famous museums. The ones we visited are National Gallery of Art (classic art museum), British Museum (history, art and culture museum), Tate Modern (modern art) and Madame Tussaud's (was musuem) as well as Tussaud's Rock Circus (now closed). Most major museums in London are not even very impressive, they also have free entrance!
In 2022 I visited the Tower of London for the first time, that is a both a historical fortress, a museum and a defense tower, about 1000 years old. Here you find the Crown Jewles. It is situated in East London, overlooking the Thames. Next to the Tower is the Tower Bridge (completed 1896), that is the most iconic bridge in London with its two 65m tall towers that has an uupper panorama bridge.
The most famous squares in London is Trafalgar Square, where you find the Lord Nelson Column and the National Gallery of Art, St-Martin-in-the-fields Church, a fountain and many other sculptures -. and Piccadilly Circus with neon lights at dark, the Eros statue and a traffic intersection. It is very lively, at least after the pandemic, with stores, theatres and night clubs.
London has a vibrant Chinatown near Soho. Soho is one of the most famous areas in the city center, and is known for its vibrant nigh life, pubs, special stores and many drunk are out at night. It is a major entertainment district.
There are many big and famous railway stations in London, the biggest and busiest are Victoria Station, London Bridge Station, Charing Cross Station, St Pancras Station, King's Cross Station, Paddington Station, Stratford Station, Liverpool Street Station Euston Station and Waterloo Station.
London is also a city of parks. Hyde Park is the most famous one and one of the biggest in central London, but the neighbouring Kensington Gardens, Green Park, St James Park and Regent's Park are more beautiful. From the hilly Primrose Hill and Hampstead Heath there are views over London.
The most famous luxury hotels in London are the Ritz, Langham, Rosewood and Savoy. London has several Hiltons, Marriotts, Hyatts, Holiday Inns and other chains.
London is connected underground by one of the world's oldest subways -
The "Underground". It is is the fastest way to get around in London. Most stations are old fahioned, but some are more modern with glass doors that separate the station from the tracks. There are more modern trains now then last time we visited, in 2006. Docklands has it's own lightrail train, DLR, which are more modern.
MY EXPERIENCE:
The first time I visited London
(in 1999), at first I felt nothing special about London when we got off the
"underground" at Piccadilly Circus, arriving directly from Heathrow
Airport. But after some days of walking and travelling with dubbeldecker bus,
I discovered that London is a vibrant, beautiful and exciting city with many
faces. It is a mixture between history and a modern cosmopolitan metropolis
- not by far as oldfashioned as I had imagined. The weather was also better,
it was only raining for some hours in two days, and when we arrived it was
very sunny. We stayed at the City of London Hostel near St Paul's Cathedral.
Most of the architecture feels old and often beautiful (though the white buildings
fastly get dirty), but there are also modern buildings (mostly from the 70s)
and new skyscrapers have fastly arisen in the financial district and in Dockalnds
for the first time in decades. Even if London is a vibrant cosmopolitan
city with much young culture, it is sometimes also a very conservative monumental
city. Just like New York, London is divided in several districts called boroughs.
There is also over an hour of film from the first journey, including pics
from the airplane, unfortunately not available.
In 2005, we came back. We stayed at the cheap
Piccadilly Backpackers Hostel at Piccadilly Circus for one week in May 2005(Tuesday-Tuesday).
We travelled by the low fare airline Ryan Air from Malmö-Sturup Airport
to London-Stansted Airport. We experienced many new areas and sights where
I didn't go in 1999, like Canary Wharf, Madame Tussauds, Notting Hill, Paddington,
British Museum, Primrose Hill, Hyde Park(yes), Hamstead Heth and Greenwich,
and there was also better opporturnities to take good photographs, since I
have a much better camera now (a digicam instead of a "onetime camera").
London has also got new attractions like The Eye and many new skyscrapers.
Most of the food we bought was cheap (in supermarkets), but I think that London
has become a lot more expensive than before. When staying at the hostel, we
learned to know some of our roommates and made sightseeing together.
In 2022, I came back again, alone. I stayed at the Wombat's The City Hostel near the Tower of London for 4 nights. The last night I stayed in the Best Western Boltons Hotel, a 4-star hotel in Earl's Court, just south of Kensington.
The weather was very changing. It used to begin with rain and clouds in the
morning. Most days, in the afternoon it had became sunny and warm. On the
Friday it was like a warm summer day the whole day. The leaves of the trees
were also there, bringing a warmer atmosphere in May 2005 than in April 1999.
In 2022 it was warm and sunny with very clear skiesall the time, it was only a bit grey last day. The trees were already green and it was unusually warm for April 14-22 degrees C.
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