On a rather summery but windy day about 2 weeks ago I ventured down to London again, is time to explore Tower Bridge and the surrounding area as, despite it being a tourist hotspot, I've never really explored it.
I took the Metropolitan line to Baker Street where I then changed to the Jubilee line and got off at Waterloo for what I was told would be a quick walk before reaching the Thames. It might have been shorter had I not started walking in the opposite direction to start with but the walk ended up taking me around half an hour through some rather dodgy streets! Eventually I found London Bridge, completely missing Borough Market, a place I've wanted to visit for so long, and wandered down through Southwark to Tower Bridge.
One of the main reasons I wanted to visit this area was to visit one of the Team GB fanzones. The day I visited was one of the bigger rowing days of the Olympics and I thought it would be nice to watch some of the rowing on the bank of the Thames with a big group of people. So after walking as fast as I could and working up quite a sweat (nice) I got to the fanzone to find the screen wasn't working. Disappointed, I ventured to Leon and ordered none other than the halloumi wrap of course, took it to a bench on the side of the river and watched the rowing on my phone. It was a struggle not to get really excited when I watched Katherine Grainger and Vicky Thornley bring home a silver medal in the women's double. A few races later and a lot of iced tea later and I needed the loo (TMI? sorry). Now usually I'd have thought this issue was easy to resolve, hundreds of coffee shops and restaurants in London there must be a toilet in one of them? Well you'd be wrong. A 2-3 mile walk and 20 coffee shops later, I found a Costa near St Pauls Cathedral which had a toilet. By this point me feet were starting to really hurt and I was so dehydrated I was thankful to find a coffee shop anyway!
Feeling relieved and refreshed I walked back over London Bridge and smelt the most incredible food smells and realised I was near Borough Market so I decided to see what all the fuss was about. There is little I love more in the world than food so subsequently there's little more I'd love to stumble across than a food market as extravagant as Borough Market. Some of the food I saw (and smelt) made me want to buy the entire stall. But I knew I was going for a meal soon and not wanting to ruin my meal I decided just to stick to tasters, including a venison burger which was delicious. What I enjoyed more was that this burger stall was directly next to a vegan stall, the irony.
Unfortunately my time in Borough Market was cut short and I could almost definitely have spent an entire day there trying everything from every stall but I was on to my next adventure. I walked (yes more walking) back to Tower Bridge and bought tickets to go up to the glass viewing point. Because I'm quite an active person and perhaps slightly crazy (and extremely impatient) I decided we would walk up the stairs to the top instead of waiting for the lift, something I would not recommend after a heavy week of training. At the point I thought was half way up I could feel my legs burning, at the actual half way point I wondered why I didn't have more patience but at the top I realised the view was worth it. From one side I could see all the way down to Greenwich where the O2 arena was sticking up above Canary Wharf. On the other side, the London Eye, St Pauls and HMS Belfast. Both sides have a glass floor which allow you to see down to the river and the road below, when tall boats come under it is the prime view to see the bridge open and close, something we were lucky enough to see.
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| Just a selfie above the Thames |
By this time we were hungry so made our way to Shad Thames to scope out the options. In the end we chose Ask Italian, mainly because we had a discount code, we're not cheap at all! An Aperol Spritz and mozzarella sticks later I actually felt like I was in a foreign country it was such a beautiful evening! The food was delicious and the evening sky was turning a beautiful shade of purple/pink so we wandered down the river bank slowly.
Back at the fanzone the screen was finally working and a review of the day's Olympic competitions was on. Of course when the rowing was on I was completely engrossed and totally oblivious to the changing evening sky, the increasing wind and the loud music coming from the bar area. By this time it was around 10pm and definitely time to leave as we had a long drive home but it was another one of those moments which made me fall deeper in love with this magical city.
I'm so excited to be moving closer this year (YES I GOT INTO UNI PEOPLE, more on that if people are interested to hear about it) AND I'm going to make sure I visit even more and I'll keep you updated on my afternoon adventures!
Thanks for Reading
Charlotte
XO
