Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
talks
are offered throughout the day. The
audioguide
(included in admission) con-
tains video clips that show the church in action. You can also download this chapter
Climbing the Dome:
It's 528 steps to the top and a mere 257 to the first viewing level.
(While there's an elevator for people with disabilities, it does not go up into the
dome's galleries—only down to the crypt.) Allow an hour to go up and down. The
tower has three levels, called galleries. The climb gets steeper, narrower, and more
claustrophobic as you go higher. It's a one-way system, so you can't come back down
until you reach the next level.
Length of This Tour:
Allow one hour, two if you climb the dome. If you're in a rush, skip
the crypt and the dome.
Photography:
No photography allowed.
Eating:
There's a good café (
£
5 soups and sandwiches,
£
8 main dishes) and a pricier res-
taurant (
£
15 “express lunch,”
£
22-26 meals, afternoon tea) in the crypt; free access
from north side of church. There are several places to get a quick bite in Paternoster
Nearby:
A helpful TI is located to the right of the church. Just behind the church, to
the east, is a modern shopping mall topped by a terrace with great views of the
church—not a bad substitute for the dome climb for those disinclined to pay the entry
fee and/or climb so many steps (free elevator to top floor). Millennium Bridge is a
five-minute walk south, leading to the South Bank (Tate Modern and Shakespeare's
Globe).
Starring:
Sir Christopher Wren, his dome, and World War II.
(See “St. Paul's Cathedral” map,
here
.)
Even now, as skyscrapers encroach, the 365-foot-high dome of St. Paul's rises majestically
above the rooftops of the neighborhood. The tall dome is set on classical columns, capped
with a lantern, topped by a six-foot ball, and iced with a cross. As the first Anglican
cathedral built in London after the Reformation, it is Baroque: St. Peter's in Rome filtered
through clear-eyed English reason.
