Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
tanneries and its factories. So much of the city's food - teas, wines, grain, butter, bacon
and cheese - was stored here that it was nicknamed “London's Larder”. Bermondsey
also became infamous for some of the worst social conditions in Victorian London, as
Charles Kingsley discovered: “O God! What I saw! People having no water to drink but
the water of the common sewer which stagnates full of…dead fish, cats and dogs.”
Badly bombed in the Blitz, the docks had closed down by the 1960s. They have
since undergone a Docklands-style regeneration, and much of the original warehouse
architecture has been preserved, particularly east of Tower Bridge, around Butler's
Wharf.
HMS Belfast
, the cruiser moored near City Hall, is the only permanent
maritime link. Nearby the curvaceous dock of Hay's Wharf, originally built to
accommodate tea clippers like the
Cutty Sark
, has been filled and transformed into
the
Hay's Galleria
, a shopping precinct whose (year-round) Christmas Shop is a must
if you've got children. The area's most popular attraction today, however, is of course
The
Shard,
London's latest priapic skyscraper.
The Shard
32 London Bridge • Daily 9am-10pm • £25 online •
T
0844 499 7111,
W
theviewfromtheshard.com •
!
London Bridge
London's - and the country's - tallest building,
The Shard
is squeezed in beside London
Bridge Station. While there's a case to be argued for the City's skyscrapers, and for
those at Canary Wharf, it's harder to justify such a hubristic (Qatari-funded) enterprise
south of the river. Even less justifiable are the ticket prices to reach the viewing
platforms on floors 68, 69 and 72 of Renzo Piano's 1016ft, tapered, glass-clad tower
block. Still, once you're there, if you can ignore the New Age music, the views are
sublime, making everything else in London look small, from the unicycle of the
London Eye to the tiny little box of St Paul's Cathedral, while the model railway that is
London Bridge is played out below you. Book online and make sure you go to the very
top where you can feel the breeze blowing through the crowning shards.
16
London Bridge Experience
2-4 Tooley St • Mon-Fri & Sun 10am-5pm, Sat 10am-6pm • From £16 online •
T
0800 0434 666,
W
thelondonbridgeexperience.com •
!
London Bridge
Now the London Dungeon has fled to County Hall (see p.219), Gothic horror
fans should head instead to the slightly more historically pertinent
London Bridge
Experience
,
in the railway vaults on the north side of Tooley Street. First off, you're led
on a theatrical trot through the history of London Bridge, with guides in period garb
hamming up the gory bits. Then, in case you're not scared enough yet, in the
London
Tombs
section (no under-11s), more actors, dressed as zombies and murderers, leap out
of the foggy gloom to frighten the wits out of you. Finally, in peace and quiet, you get
to peruse some artefacts from (and a model of ) old London Bridge.
HMS Belfast
The Queen's Walk • Daily: March-Oct 10am-6pm; Nov-Feb 10am-5pm • £13.15 •
T
020 7940 6300,
W
iwm.org.uk/visits/hms-belfast •
!
London Bridge
Permanently moored opposite Southwark Crown Court, the camouflage-painted
HMS
Belfast
is an 11,550-ton Royal Navy cruiser. Launched in Belfast in 1938, the
Belfast
spent the first two years of the war in the Royal Naval shipyards, after being hit by a
mine in the Firth of Forth. It later saw action in the 1943 Battle of North Cape and
assisted in the D-Day landings before being decommissioned after the Korean War, and
becoming an outpost of the Imperial War Museum.
The fun bit is exploring the maze of cabins and scrambling up and down the
vertiginous ladders of the ship's seven confusing decks, which could accommodate a
crew of over nine hundred. Be sure to check out the punishment cells, in the most
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT
BOROUGH MARKET
P.230
; MILLENNIUM BRIDGE
P.227
;
SOUTHWARK CATHEDRAL
P.230
; THE GLOBE
P.228
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