Being a tourist September 2014

It was a lovely day today so we decided to go to London. I wanted to see the   Ceramic poppies at the Tower and Malcolm wanted to see what was happening to Sea Containers House.

The Tower of London.

The poppies are unbelievable. I wasn't expecting to see so many

                           

   This is the army of volunteeres assembling the poppies. They had big boxes of all the parts and were in teams. There is still a lot of space to fill. It looked like very painstaking work. There were so many it was hard to decide where the best place was for taking photos.

I think this is probably my favourite

Or maybe this with the Shard in the background.

                 

The plan is to place the last one on 11/11. There will be a poppy for every service man that died during WW1. It will look incredible by then but we will be in Oz so we might have to fit in a quick visit before we go.

We were lucky enough to be on Tower Bridge when it was raised to let a tall ship go through.

It raises really fast and all the pedestrians get herded into a little pen, all you can see is the bridge going higher and higher. It was impossible to see what was actually sailing past from where I was.

However, we did see it raise for this one..

     

I managed to get some iconic shots, the Mayors office and the Shard

Tower Bridge.

                                Me and the Shard. It absolutely dominates the whole skyline. Where ever you are you can see it.

We went to where Sea Containers House used to be. 

It's gone! Well not literally, but the whole area is just a massive building site. It was really hard to work out where everything used to be. We couldn't get very close because it was all cordoned off. It was a bit mind boggling really.

If you remember, this huge tower is where the IPC building used to be

We got a boat from the Tower to the Eye. There is lots going on along the river side . This ride is one I shall be avoiding.

The Eye.

                 

There are all kinds of street performers along that stretch of river. This soppy bint was messing about cracking a whip

She "whipped" this rose out of matey boys gob, allegedly . I think he just spat it out. She's in the Guiness Book of Records. Best Whipper in the world apparently! Hmmm.

What I didn't get a photo of was the dog that went a bit bonkers as she cracked the whip just as it walked past. Scared the crap out of the poor animal ,and her,as it tried to bite the whip out of her hand. Only in London .......