Two weeks in London: Day 14

The Shard in the distance

 We were planning to go to Bedford by train to visit the Higgins Art Museum and Gallery, having discovered that we could get there in an hour from Farringdon Station which is a short walk from the flat.  However, as the curtain hanging had not progressed as well as hoped we decided to stay in London so that we could go over to Stoke Newington in the afternoon.

We rooted around in our small store of walk books and found a leaflet on walks in Wapping and Limehouse an area alongside the Thames that used to be filled with warehouses, wharfs and docks and was the centre of the commercial shipping trade dating back to the early history of London.   Much loved by Dickens! The area was bombed of course during the second world war, but many lovely old Georgian houses remain as well as elegant Hawksmoor churches and great dockside buildings, now turned into expensive flats.

Stacked gravestones

A Hawskmoor church

Pirate ships, apparently

Alongside the 'canal'

The Cable Street Riots - commemorative mural

Mural close up

The inhabitants of Cable Street rise up against Facism

Wharf building

Warehouses

The Prospect of Whitby

Peter at the Prospect of Whitby

We stopped for lunch at the Prospect of Whitby an old Thames side pub and then caught a bus back to the flat where we collected the moussaka I had made earlier and went off to Simon and Tania's for more work on the curtain track and the curtains.  Slow progress!  Especially as we all got progressively more tired!

Men at work