Greenwich, London, UK
 

I am typing this in my new living room in Greenwich, London. Well, it's new to me anyway - I have moved into the house of my friend of 20+ years, who has very kindly taken me in as a waif and stray (more stray at the moment I admit.)

He is currently only home at the weekends as he's working on a shoot in Wales. This is good news as it means I get to ease into living with another person gradually. Bad news as he takes his laptop with him and I'll only have weekend access to the Cellar until September. But hey, that's better than nothing!

My boys have come with me, and are currently circling the house wide eyed and trying to work out if we're staying this time (we came down for a trial run about 2 months ago). The good news is they have met my HM's cat again and still not tried to fight. She's nine and they're two, so hopefully they will continue to show her respect as an old lady. I just home she doesn't feel too crowded out next week when HM goes back to work - one strange woman and two strange cats in her house, she might feel a little put out.

I'm sat here surrounded by boxes and suitcases. We got here at about 05.30 this morning and I'm waiting for HM to move things out of "my" room so I can properly take possession. I'm not too bothered, I have all next week to get myself settled, but it does feel a little weird to be dallying in the Cellar while all my worldly goods are just lying around.

The reason for our all-night trek is that we've had torrential rain and floods in the UK this weekend. Poor old HM left Cardiff at about 19.45 last night, and tried three motorways before having to travel due East (as opposed North-East) just to find a road that wasn't flooded. He originally said he'd be with me 22.30 and ended up turning up gone 01.30. This is after getting up at 06.00 for a twelve hour day on set.

So we both crashed til lunchtime, and are now chilling. I am deferring to him, because as well as being kind enough to take me in, and drive approx 450 miles in order to pick me up, I also sprang this on him at very short notice. Like Wednesday night. So I'm very aware of the fact he already had his weekend planned out before he knew I'd be here!

Anyway, this is all exposition. Back to geographical location. Greenwich in London is pronounced Grennitch (not sure if that's commonly known). I'm two streets away from the Thames, a 10 minute walk from the Observatory and from the map I reckon about the same from the Dome. I'll link to the Google Earth map when I work out how, and as soon as I'm unpacked and sorted, I'll go out and take some pics. It might be next weekend before I can get on and upload them, but that might give me the time to take some good ones rather than just point and shoot.

Hi SG! Happy landings! Greenwich is a pretty good bit of London to be in. Hope you get settled in OK.

Congratulations Sundae.

At least we will always know what time it is at your place.

Maybe Undertoad will switch the Cellar from Greenwich Mean Time to Sundae Girl Time.

Fun Facts:

Greenwich is 0 longitude.
Greenwich is home to the Greenwich Observatory, a pioneer in accurate timekeeping, which was necessary for navigation.

Here's a good site.

Welcome to the capital SG, don't trip over that meridian line when your out and about! Glad you're settling in OK (or seem to be). Look forward to your photos (should jog my memory cells when I see them). Just heard about the rain (make that deluges) myself having been away from the UK a few days. Blighty seems to be suffering a lot with storms and unsettling weather this year. Fingers crossed for August being more like a summer should be!

Unfortunately, I couldn't afford to live at the prime meridian. The best I could do is ground or chuck.

At least it's not the tenderloin.

There has only been one good day weather-wise since I moved in, so I took the opportunity to jump on a bus into town. I love to travel London by bus, you get heart stopping glimpses of the landmarks when you least expect them, and you also get to see the living, breathing (and in this case sweating) city.

The two below are my tourist shots, because I spent a lot of time in Waterloo as a child and seeing the Houses of Parliament and the South Bank (where the Eye is now, although a relative newcomer) was like greeting old friends.

This is the former Millennium Dome, now the O2 Dome - a concert venue. It's where I'm going to see Prince.

I took the photo from the riverside walk along the Thames, but the factory on the left hand side is at the end of my road. It started chucking it down soon after I took this, and although I don't mind the rain I didn't think it would do the area justice if I took pictures in that weather.

So more to follow, promise.

Forgot to add on the above pictures, the 188 stops just across the end of my road and goes all the way into the centre of London. It comes within spitting distance of Tower Bridge, past the Old Vic (theatre), across Waterloo Bridge and so on. Which delights me - when I'm working I suppose I'll go everywhere by Tube or at least overland train, but for the time being I'll enjoy the view from the top deck of the bus.

I read somewhere the double decker busses were being phased out? Maybe it way somewhere else.
Waterloo is the area around the Waterloo Bridge, or a section of london?

They phased out the old Routemaster buses, which were the ones which were open at the back and you could embark and disembark while they were moving. Not only was this considered dangerous, and the buses not friendly for disabled passengers or prams, but it also meant the driver did not see the passengers so a conductor was necessary. Obviously a bus where the passengers enter past the driver means the staffing can be halved.

There are articulated buses in London, but they are unpopular with drivers (slower and taking up twice the amount of road) and not really suitable for the tighter streets of central London. Certainly 75% of the buses I've seen between here and town have been fairly new double deckers, the remainder have been single deckers on the local routes. The only articulated buses I've seen were 5 years ago, in Ealing (West London). I doubt double deckers will be completely phased out here.

Waterloo is the area around Waterloo Station and Waterloo Bridge. Away from the river it's a residential area, but it does have quite a few things to see and it's a 5-10 minute walk to most of the other sights from there. My Grandparents lived there until I was 12, and I still mentally navigate most routes from either Waterloo or Westminster Bridge.

Old habits die hard. My mother still frets that I take the back(dirt) roads to her house instead of the paved way 'round.

Hi SG - a few places to consider visiting. Try the back streets around Borough Market - that's next to Southwark Cathedral on the south and wets side of London Bridge. The area has become a bit trendy these days, but there's still some original spots, like Clink Street which was the site of London's oldest prison. Walk a little further around the lanes and back twoards the Thames and you'll cone across the very old Anchor pub, and just along from there is the reconstructed Globe Theatre. Trace your steps back to London Bridge Road and heading south about 100 yards on the left is The George Tavern (can't find a picture) an old coaching inn in a private yard.

Another pub worth visiting is the Blackfriar on the north side of Blackfriar's Bridge - it's pure English Arts and Crafts Movement design with plenty of beaten copper murals and original features inside. Move into Fleet street and there's the Cheshire Cheese pub (a haunt of Charles Dickens) and also Dr Samuel Johnson's house (just behind Fleet street in an old cobbled courtyard).

Lastly, on a Sunday, try Spittalfields Market - close by Liverpool Street Station and off Bishopsgate in London EC3 - it has lots of intersting shops and resaturants - and probably the best Tapas bar/restaurant in the city!

Shame on you cf, tempting our sweet innocent Sundae Girl into unwittingly traipsing into those dens of iniquity that serve the devils spirits.

That tapas bar (damn, what's it called, I can see it now ...) is where I've spent some fine lunches and evenings way back when I was something in the city ... You brought back some (of the very few) good memories of those times for me CF ...

I hope it's this one... - I used to go there quite regularly myself in the 90's when I worked for Reuters and handled their shipping service (I used to be a tanker broker prior to joining Reuters - the Reuters service was a high speed messaging facility for the tanker market way before the Internet and Yahoo and MSN messaging). I had some great lunches there too, with fellow brokers, who had by then become customers!

That's the one. Prolly saw you there ... :3_eyes: