vs. Oxford. London - Part 2: London Updated (sort of) Happy New Year to Everyone!
And thanks for all the greetings, comments and commentary attempts;)
before and around Christmas I was, as mentioned before, twice in London. The first time with Hannah for a weekend. We have spent a whole day just to go to London from sight to sight. Google says that we are on this day at least 14km run - sounds little, but the next day I had a mad-sore muscles, the route and the sights are on my Google map
to To see that I updated for London.
good - I have about 400 photos of London (and I've already deleted the bad ones) and no idea how I present the best ... I will try, somehow the order of the tour (see above) to maintain, since there are the main attractions. What I have not seen yet come to the end:)
Have fun!
With Hannah I was living in a B & B in Bloomsbury. The district is located north of Westminster - CIty of today, where the main government building and are therefore the most attractions.
The red "telephone booth" are still standing. None phone - only Japanese (and even German) photographed in or next to them ....
In virtually every major road in and around Bloomsbury, there is a theater or opera house. Currently playing here include Christian Slater (in one piece, I do not know) and Sir Ian McKellen in King Lear. Unfortunately, I have seen of course, no two ... Nevertheless, I think it's great to go to on a theatrical past and to see that here just working a famous actor! That would never happen to me in Dresden (then ultimately we have seen
Lord of the Rings that just as the largest and most expensive musical ever to be played in London, mobile phones,.
Gertie and I were of the opinion that such a thing can only see in London and has (as you do for a part, needs an incredible stage technology and it is likely the other hand, that the show is too expensive and never abroad come) . The Bühenbild really was huge - a type of tree that reached up into the audience. Most of the effects caused by the (really) good lighting and the story was also quite useful combined and shortened. On the other hand, is the Lord of the Rings such a long and rich history that even the "short version" takes 3 hours. The music I found it very good, but unfortunately the songs were only short and rather sporadic distributed about the play - in fact it deserves the designation Musical does not - it was more a play with singing performances. With the extensive history was also an unfortunate little space. Very different from the original, Galadriel has fortunately a fairly large proportion of the story. Positive, as it clearly was the best singer and best song (even more!) Had. The others were ok (but they had not much opportunity to show their skills, since each only a short song was allocated). Middle of the piece suddenly stormed orcs into the audience, which made for some excitement, and in the end it was quite loud - I had to hold my ears, but could yet still understand every word. The English was easy to understand, unless all sang by another ... Conclusion: Probably not a typical musical (as Billy Elliot might have been better) but I had not seen it, I would certainly have the feeling of having missed something Fare. Also: If every musical advertises to be the best, funniest or most in London - how can you decide when?
The next item on the line: Covent Garden - the only place where I've really seen Christmas decorations.
Unexpectedly, it is very quiet Christmas in London. 25.12. drives no U-Bahn (incredible for such a large city) and not even McDonalds on the corner was open ... I had all along felt that the people who were on the road, but tourists were and in many, especially rich areas, the houses seemed to be empty. Probably take many of London over the holidays to the country and to relatives. In any case, London was far from being the party capital that I had expected ...
right next to Covent Garden is St Paul's - not the Cathedral ...
As you can see, has my Christmas present - a new camera - a setting for sepia images. As a consequence, half of my pictures is brown:)
In the area of Covent Garden, there are also many nice shops, but it was closed when we were there.
Get out to Trafalgar Square.
stands on the pillar Lord Nelson, the victor over Napoleon at Trafalgar.
law - the National Gallery. Apart from the
"Madonna of the Rocks" by Leonardo da Vinci and the "Arnolfini Portrait
" full of images of famous painters, but with no known pictures of famous artists;) (Although I might prefer not should be based on my own limited knowledge). The really well-known images, such as Rembrandt's self portrait, were not strange way there. Nevertheless, one can spend hours, even if one wants to see just the highlights. (My favorite picture -
The Execution of Lady Jane Grey - the pictures are nice as can be found on Wikipedia).
in Trafalgar Square is also St. Martin in the Fields, which is famous for its choir. While the Schneiders were with me in the musical, my parents here
have listened to Baroque concert. In the crypt there is a cafe within which Gertie and I decided to sample at random a Bread & butter pudding, which looked bad but was very tasty. The English food must therefore not be so bad;)
In the south it goes on to government area - the House of Parliament is already visible from the Trafalgar Square.
It's the Whitehall Street down, past a number of souvenir stalls,
the Horse Guards, where to walk because of the many tourists on the street must
and idyllic No. 10, Downing Street , with its Christmas tree, their 3-equipped guards with machine guns and its handsome iron railings ...
comes at last to Parliament Square, where the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey are.
the best view but you always nor of the bridge and the other side:
On the other hand - expensive and slow, with no seats but with a long snake: London Eye
added back on the next bridge is a beautiful view on the Charing Cross Office Building (brand new - first I thought that was the Charing Cross station , but, fortunately just underneath ...).
Links from Charing Cross: my favorite buildings - Whitehall Court (Hotel, Home, National Liberal Club). There I would definitely like to live.
Further downstream (or right side of Charing Cross) is Cleopatra's Needle, a build of 3 obelisks of Thutmose III in Heliopolis in Egypt, brought from Cleopatra to Alexandria and the British, Americans and Frenchmen New York, London and Paris have been established.
So I feel good:)
The Sphinx is not genuine, even if Thutmose Name (Men-cheper re-plan is).
On the long journey to the Tower you pass on the Inner and Middle Temple. This area belonged to the Templars, the Temple Church built there, which unfortunately you can not just visit.
After the Templars were expropriated, the lawyers moved into the area and are located there today. Inner and Middle Temple Inns of Court are called, ie, bar associations and related buildings. A lawyer must belong to one of the four Inns. In the yards, it is wonderfully quiet and green, because the entire area from the rest of London foreclosed (we have only found an open door and watched).
in further east is the City of London - the old city center. Apart from the Tower and Tower Bridge seems there is nothing left to be old. All is full of banks, insurance companies and modern glass architecture;)
Here a nice Instance:
This is the Swiss Re Tower, known as "the gherkin" called. As the London still call this building (added names that impose themselves literally)
is here on Wikipedia.
But before reaching the Tower, it's still at the Millennium Bridge, which connects St. Paul's Cathedral with the Tate Modern Gallery.
St. Paul's is really huge. We had decided to visit a church here on Christmas Eve and when we got there an hour before, we had already run once for the whole Church to the end of the queue of people waiting to find already.
After waiting for fifteen minutes (during which I the sepia setting my camera discovered), we were within 10 minutes in the building (although several hundred people were ahead of us in line) and inside we found still a place Stitz. Unfortunately, the choir
had no microphone, and was poorly positioned so that we only heard him quietly. I had expected that we were the same songs, like singing in Germany, would only with English text, but the carols we all known (up to a piece by Bach, the choir sang in German).
Here again a beautiful view from the Millennium Bridge to St. Paul's:
The Millennium Bridge is a pedestrian bridge high above the Thames - not just my case. It was quite windy there:
The Tate Modern is home (as the name implies) modern art, such as from 1900. I must admit that I am modern art is not exactly enthusiastic. I had terrible headache that day, my capacity has also affected not particularly positive.
The exhibition begins at the door with the spider-like structure of Louise Bourgeois (which is still quite nice, compared to the Socialist Realism that I have seen later). Also right art can be seen: Doris Salcedo - Shibboleth
, a crack in the floor of the lowest museum hall. For the meaning I am sorry to quote (after 10 hours of interrupted work on this Entry refuses my brain to think about possible meanings themselves): "Shibboleth asks questions about the interaction of sculpture and space, of ARCHITECTURE and the values it contains, and the shaky ideological foundations on which the Western concept of modernity built up. " I'm not even come on it! I have liked the paintings of Gerhard Richter
and the "Quattro Stagioni
" (4 seasons) of Cy Twombly.
Although still missing half of London, I'm doing now break ... Off to bed!
strained after 2 weeks more or less interrupted and learning I finally got my "Exams" behind me, and holidays! (I ask that comments that I'm here anyway on a holiday to refrain if possible.) The tests and the current situation in Bath will, I again pay an extra entry - did so now viiiiel time.
So (finally) on the London program. The
city tour continues:
The last stop on the main route now missing is the Tower and Tower Bridge
We were unfortunately very late to the Tower, so we had only 2 hours to see everything. A lot of it was while queuing for the crown jewels (nice, sparkling look, but not too much) on it. The tower itself is unfortunately not very photogenic - that is too large, so you always have only excerpts from the pictures. Moreover, it was dark ...
Whatever you shoot - it's all gray stone ...
As the Christmas tree where now stands once stood the scaffold ...
(People grieve in the foreground to Anne Boleyn).
The Traitors - formerly covered by water, so that the condemned by boat to the Tower could bring - to the land being contaminated by the city, where citizens may view the defendant and sympathy had developed (ie to avoid a riot).
Variations on the Tower Bridge
Piccadilly Circus and Chinatown
Piccadilly Circus is not soo impressive - in movies does the advertising wall from becoming larger and more colorful, but really there is only McDonald's, Samsung and Coca Cola ... And the difference between Chinatown and the rest of London is mainly in the smell of food.
window in Chinatown
Kensington Palace in the western part of Hyde Park
lived here Princess Diana
As you can see, you go to the palm trees in England magnificently. Also in December.
found all the weather on Christmas Day, bad ...
south of Hyde Park the Royal Albert Hall (opera and concert hall).
leave Christmas relative: Notting Hill and
Portobello Road Market (for more impressions your back on the movie "Notting Hill")
"Porto Bello - with its rotting vegetables, Union Jack Y-fronts and salt- of-the-earth cheeriness - Seemed symbol of harmony, humanity and joy. " (Citing Bridget Jones - sorry, I've recently read both books and the online archive ...)
Finally we were still at Horrords (äääh Harrods). Terribly full, terribly expensive, but a beautiful Christmas decoration!
That was London
(Where the daffodils bloom has been true for Christmas). 
On-Avon Kenneth channel are a lot of imaginative boats, whose inhabitants are referred to vaguely as New Age followers. At least five of these boats are called Bilbo Baggins (counted it myself). 
No. 3 Bristol - also very pretty (almost as Wells). In the middle: Henry VIII) 
