London Bankside by Night

Millennium Bridge

Last night I took a walk around the Bankside area of London. Bankside is one of my favourite parts of London and it stretches all the way from London Bridge to Blackfriars Bridge.  I’ve posted about the area immediately around London Bridge and Borough Market before but this is the first time in ages that I have wondered all the way up to the Tate Modern with a camera.

City of London

The views from Bankside on the Southern Bank of the river Thames are quite exceptional.  You can see 30 St. Mary Axe (fondly known as ‘The Gherkin’) peeking out in the middle of the photo above.  You can also just make out Southwark Bridge and Cannon Street Railway Bridge at the far right of the photo.

City of London School and St Paul’s Cathedral

St Paul's Cathedral looks exquisite at night time and you really can’t help but stare at it!

The City of London viewed over the Millennium Bridge

It is probably best that I confess how very, very cold it was outside last night!  These photos were only taken at about 5pm and as you can see, it was already completely dark in London.  The temperature at the time was about 2°c which equates to too-cold-to-be-outside-taking-photos in Fahrenheit. 

The Founders Arms

I was wondering around because I was attending the London Travel Bloggers Meetup at the Founders Arms at 6pm and I had an hour to kill!  Behind me was the towering chimney of the old Bankside Power Station, now known as the Tate Modern.

The Tate Modern

Behind the Tate Modern, there is an exciting new residential development called NEO Bankside.  Of course, not everyone shares my love of modern architecture but I think these are stunning.

 
The NEO Bankside Development

I gratefully made it into the warm interior of the Tate Modern building and not a moment too soon.  I’d lost feeling in my toes!

The Tate Modern

 

I took a look at The Unilever Series: Ai Weiwei Sunflower Seeds exhibition which is strangely mesmerising.  I was almost overcome with an urge to touch the seeds (because we were told not to) and I was quite taken by the sea of handmade porcelain sunflower seed replicas.

I also saw two other photographic exhibitions in the Tate which I would highly recommend: Bruce Davidson's Subway series as well as the Photographic Typologies exhibition featuring Simryn Gill's Dalam series and Paul Graham’s Television Portraits.

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Wordless Wednesday ~ 46: Happy Birthday Dad!

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My Dad is 65 today and like me, he has a terrible sense of humour.  This is him pretending to be a shop mannequin. 

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Weekend Snapshots ~ 8: New Camera!

I finally bought a new camera today and I’m having lots of fun playing around with it and setting it up.  I love the way it feels in my hands and I just love how it functions too.  I went through last Sunday morning to Jessups in Bluewater Mall and immediately rejected all of the cameras that had been on my shortlist as they just didn’t feel right.  My friend had a Canon that I had been playing around with a short while ago and so I settled on the Canon 1000 D with an image stabilising lens.  I went back again this morning and picked it up.  I’m quite looking forward to going out and about in the next couple of weeks and trying it out.  For now, I present my menagerie:

Josey (born 18 January 2004)

Molly (born 23 January 2004)

Seth (born 4 September 2006)

Summer (born 4 September 2006)

I could do with some happy thoughts on Thursday! I’m writing my first exam but have no doubt I’ll pass.  I was ready to write about three weeks ago.

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Wordless Wednesday ~ 45: Piscator

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Weekend Snapshots ~ 7: A Whirlwind Tour to Manchester

Mister Emm is a Manchester United fan but I know most of you will be kind enough not to hold that against him (or at least leave me out of it!)  After three years in England, he decided to splash out on a season ticket for Old Trafford this season.  Now I know that the very astute amongst you might have noticed the flaw here.  Yes, that’s right, we live in London.  Suffice to say, Mister Emm spends every other weekend driving up to Manchester for matches and he drives back down again the next day or even that same evening.  We are very lucky to have friends in Manchester that don’t mind him camping out in their spare room nearly every weekend!

Last weekend we rushed off to Manchester for one night.  We were meant to leave at about 7am but as you can imagine, I need my beauty sleep and we only left around 9am!  Lucky we left that late too, otherwise we would never have had the pleasure of getting stuck behind a serious accident for nearly an hour!!!  When I took this photo, our engine was off and very soon afterwards, all these Manchester United supporters were getting out of their cars and socialising.  My contribution to the cause was to sit on Twitter and complain. 

We got to Old Trafford just in time for the game and Stephen had to kick me out of the car and rush inside.  This was the only photo I managed to get of the stadium before hopping on to a bus to Piccadilly.

I am not sure if they have completely refurbished Piccadilly but it looked nothing like I remember it.  In fact, I thought it was quite pretty and it had a super vibe.

It has definitely made me want to visit Manchester again in the near future (I have to confess to avoiding it like the plague in favour of Liverpool.  I met up with my Dad and step-Mum at their hotel and we went off to do some shopping and visited some pubs.

This plaque was just under the Primark and reads “The Football League was founded here on 17th April 1888 at the Royal Hotel which stood on this site”. 

My biggest problem with Manchester is that this huge grey cloud seems to be permanently located above it.  There is a lot of encouragement from my friends and family to move up there but I’m just not a big fan of Manchester.  I think I’d have a problem living in Liverpool and that was my favourite city on Earth (before I visited New York and Novi Sad). Perhaps if I visited in the middle of summer I would see something different?  What is your least favourite city and why?

Anyway, it was lovely to see my Dad and step-Mum and once the game had finished, Mister Emm joined us for an eat-as-much-as-you-like Chinese buffet.  Yum!

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Wordless Wednesday ~ 44: Platform 9¾

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Win An A-list Experience With Freixenet

London is undoubtedly one of the biggest playgrounds of the rich and famous.   In South Africa, we were celebrity-starved and it was really exciting moving to London and feeling all of a sudden like I could run into a major star at any minute.  I used to be glued to tabloid newspapers and magazines, reading all about the antics of stars like Emma Watson and Sienna Miller as they visited (and fell out of) London’s swanky venues.  Of course, I am just a mere mortal and the idea of being able (or willing) to afford going to one of these places is quite remote so this little competition is right up my alley!

Freixenet (pronounced ‘fresh-eh-net’) is a famous Spanish Cava producer and they are launching the most incredible competition on their Facebook page today.  The prize will be a once-in-a-lifetime chance to spend an evening enjoying the spoils and benefits of the A-list lifestyle.  The winner of the VIP (Very Impromptu Parties) competition will receive an invitation for them and their friends to attend an evening at Amika, one of London’s most exclusive venues.  They will be treated to Freixenet’s premium brand, Cordon Negro and given canapés fit for the A-list. 

Perhaps the most exciting part of the prize is that winners will be treated to a dance lesson from the star of Strictly Come Dancing, Brendan Cole!  How amazing is that??? 

I think it sounds like an amazing competition (and no, I’m not being paid to say that!).  I like the idea that it is just a night and a chance to experience something completely different for just one evening.  And no, I’m not deluded enough to think that I’ll run into some actual celebrities or become Paris Hilton’s new, British BFF but nevertheless, I’d like to win this one!

I’m definitely going to enter and maybe, just maybe if I win, I’ll take some of you along with me!

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Wordless Wednesday ~ 43: Rooftops in Crieff

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The Scottish Town of Crieff

It seems strange to me that a couple of months have passed since I visited Scotland.  But it is true!  It has been a crazy and busy time but my memories of the most lovely and idyllic holiday remain.  After our first day in which I took a walk around Lock Monzievaird, we drove on down to the nearby town of Crieff to see what there was to do. 

Crieff has a Tourist Information Centre which appears to be housed in an old church.  The ladies at the Centre are incredibly helpful and they really take the time to help each visitor plan their time in the area.  We left with loads of pamphlets and ideas and also a map showing us the way to the Crieff Visitor Centre back on the road to Loch Monzievaird.

Crieff is a market town and is famous for being a major cattle droving hub for hundreds of years.  I really loved the creepy architectural style of the town (and I mean ‘creepy’ in the best, most admiring kind of way!)

In the week that we were in Scotland, we spent most of our time in the council area of Perth and Kinross.  A ‘council area’ is similar to a county in England and it is a local government administrative area.  Perth and Kinross crosses the southern boundary of the Scottish Highlands so while we didn’t get to see huge mountains or majestic waterfalls, we did get to see breathtaking views wherever we went.   We visited Crieff, Aberfeldy and Pitlochry and you just had to look down the side streets to see incredible views like the one above.

We were rather amused to discover a dedicated Christmas store in Crieff.  The store is open all year round and we were amazed that they manage to stay in business!  I imagine the tourist trade helps somewhat as we certainly couldn’t resist buying personalised gifts for all of the grandchildren, nieces and godchildren in the family.

Their prices were really good too so perhaps that accounts for them staying in business!

If you follow the Scotland Here and Now blog, you will know that one of the biggest attractions to Scotland is their food and drink.  I didn’t sample nearly enough of those in my time in Scotland and that is one of the biggest reasons why I intend to return there!

We did visit this divine Whiskies and Cheese shop which was a lovely little shop full of… you guessed it, whisky and cheese.  I bought a lovely little orange and port pâté and I wished that I drank more whisky as they had a really impressive selection. 

And so with map in hand, the five intrepid travellers set off for Crieff Visitor Centre.

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