If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children.
Mahatma Gandhi
20 Comments CherryPie on Nov 5th 2009
The Tower of London wall walk provides some great views of Tower Bridge and from this viewpoint the scaffolding and envirowraps are hidden. The bridge is currently undergoing a three year restoration programme of painting works and stone cleaning. This only takes place once per quarter of a century.
I have never been in the inside the exhibition but it looks really interesting, perhaps I will get the chance next time I visit London.
8 Comments CherryPie on Nov 4th 2009
No day out is complete without some kind of hitch and Saturday was no different. I have got used to scaffolding obscuring my view so that didn’t worry me too much, in fact it becomes a bit of a challenge to get some decent photographs.
To have more time for exploring I decided it was best to eat a big meal at lunch time and grab a sandwich later to eat on the coach. So on the way to meet up with the coach I grabbed a prawn pot and a naughty cake. I sat down on the coach got the pot out of the bag ready to eat. Oh! No! due to a bit of chaos whilst paying there was no fork in the bag… Have you ever tried eating prawns in Marie Rose sauce, salad and pasta in the dark without a spoon? It was a first time experience for me 
And now I shall leave you with some photos from the wall walk.
12 Comments CherryPie on Nov 3rd 2009
On Saturday I went on a day trip to London where I spent most of the day in the Tower of London. The picture I showed in my previous post showed the curtain walls that surround the more usual view of the White Tower. If you look closely at the previous picture you can see one of the turrets that top the White Tower.
The White Tower is a central tower at the Tower of London. The great central keep was started in 1078 by William the Conqueror who ordered the White Tower to be built inside the south-east angle of The City walls, adjacent to the River Thames. [1] This was as much to protect the Normans from the people of the City of London as to protect London from outside invaders. William ordered the Tower to be built of Caen stone, which he had specially imported from France, and appointed Gundulf, Bishop of Rochester as the architect. The tower was finished around 1087 by his sons and successors, William Rufus and Henry I.
In the twelfth century, King Richard the Lionheart enclosed the White Tower with a curtain wall and had a moat dug around it filled with water from the River Thames. The moat was not successful until Henry III, in the thirteenth century, employed a Dutch moat-building technique. Henry refurnished the Chapel and had the exterior of the building whitewashed in 1240, which is how the tower got its name.
The White Tower is a massive construction, 90 feet (27.4m) high and 118 feet (35.9m) by 107 feet (32.6m) across, the walls varying from 15 feet thickness at the base to almost 11 feet in the upper parts. Above the battlements rise four turrets; three of them are square, but the one on the north-east is circular. This turret once contained the first Royal observatory. The four weather vanes on the turrets of the tower date from 1669. At the southeast corner is a semicircular protrusion which houses the Chapel of St. John.
At the moment the White Tower is undergoing repairs to the brickwork and pointing which will cost £2.5m. You can see the cleverly disguised scaffolding in the second picture.
It was a great day out, the first stop being Waterloo Barracks to see the Crown Jewels. This was a good move as the exhibition was quite quiet, there were huge queues out of the door later on. Also someone switched the sun on whilst I was in there and the afternoon was like a glorious summer’s day.
13 Comments CherryPie on Nov 2nd 2009
For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: ‘It might have been!
John Greenleaf Whittier
20 Comments CherryPie on Nov 1st 2009
I had a great day out yesterday but where did I go?
13 Comments CherryPie on Nov 1st 2009
After the battle, the bodies of both armies were taken to briefly rest at the nearby church of St Paul’s at Branxton. The church was rebuilt in 1849, so very little of the original building remains.
10 Comments CherryPie on Oct 31st 2009
