The day before heading up to London for a day trip with the children I was looking at the news. “London Calling” by The Clash seems apocalyptic enough to match the headlines of environmental crisis, viruses and all the rest of the world ending scenarios that we’re relentlessly marching towards or so my news app told me. My alternative title was “Going Underground” by The Jam which echoes a similar take on the world as that of The Clash. Then there’s another one of my favourites by The Jam, “Down in the Tube Station at Midnight”. Okay, sometimes I struggle to think of a Title for these Blogs! What I will say is that we did seem to spend a lot of time underground on the ‘Tube’ and the world didn’t in fact end. Although ironically we could have gone down the Kings Road, Chelsea and found ourselves in a district called…”The World’s End”. Man, this is all lining up perfectly!
That shot may look a little out of focus, I can’t make my mind up. We do know that my Leica is hopeless at high ISO (anything over 1600) and this was shot at about a ISO 1 Zillion, also Notting Hill Tube Station does have some natural light. We also know that my wife takes better photos than me, currently with an iPhone 11 which seems to suck in the light. She had no problem snapping away. The results are bright and usable. The downside is that they take too long to focus which is no good for Street Photography if you want to capture something quickly. By the way, the weather was dull and rainy, I’ll not mention it again, just take it for read that every time I leave the house it’s raining or dull… until further notice!
The last time we were up in London it cost us a fortune and we decided that it wasn’t an option in the future with the kids. One of those costs is Public Transport. If ‘they’ want us to use it more then it needs to be affordable. If you’re travelling alone then it makes sense, but if you happen to have a family in tow then you’ll need a small mortgage. For us to catch a train up, which I’d prefer, it’s around £140 ($185). Keep in mind that this is on a Sunday and therefore ‘Off Peak’, the journey time is 1 hour 15 minutes. We drove and parked in South Kensington for £14. That parking choice was because South Kensington is home to the Science/Victoria & Albert/Natural History museums and they’re all free to enter. Personally I would have headed for the ‘Tate Modern’ or perhaps the ‘British Museum’ (Worlds first public museum founded in 1753), again Free to enter. I know there’s some photographic opportunities there too. No, we weren’t going to those places, Sam had decided that we would head for Harrods…
On the ‘tube’ then, which is really easy. As far as world Metro systems are concerned I find the London Underground easiest, at least compared to the ones I’ve travelled on. Now, I know what you’re thinking; “Of course you do, it’s in your own country and language, you’ve used it before”. Okay, that’s a point, but we’re only looking at a map and figuring out which train to get on despite any language barriers, they should be simple to use. The Metro in Rome I managed to work out eventually after staring at the map for five or so minutes. The Paris Metro we ended up getting an App to make life easier. The New York Subway which is in my language was odd, I know “the Bronx is up and the Battery’s down, the people ride in a hole in the ground…” (I’ll have to call this blog the musical issue!), however I got confused with the subways stations, the line numbers on them and therefore which one to enter. Anyway, Piccadilly Line, couple of stops and Sam’s wish was granted :
Incidentally, that advert next to Amélie and Louis says all you need to know about the cost of public transport: '“Fly to Majorca for £48” and yet an hour and fifteen minute train journey in Peak time for Sam’s meeting in London recently cost her £88.
I might sound like someone who knows his way around London. I can tell you that many years ago, 37 years to be precise, after a night out in London, around 3:00 in the morning, I was stopped by the police. Apparently I was driving down Oxford Street the wrong way. The sheer volume of beer may have had something to do with that slight error. it was different times before you judge. The Coppers chatted to me and my friend for 10 minutes, found out that one of them used to live in the same town that we had come from (about 25 miles outside of London). They advised me to turn around, so I was at least facing the same way as other traffic, to stop at a 24 hour cafe down the road and grab some black coffee. “Take care they said and by the way, turn your lights on this time!”. True story and no I don’t condone, in any way, drink driving.
There’s a brilliant Street Photographer called Dougie Wallace. He shot some of the people in Knightsbridge or as he calls it Harrodsburg. Take a look at that link, there’s also a BBC documentary film on him which can be on found on Vimeo here . Really worth a look if you’re into Street Photography or Social Documentary. He makes some superb photos and you’ll see how he handles people. Don’t go disappearing just yet though please, I’ve got some more of my photography to show you. In that Documentary you’ll see all the ridiculously rich shoppers cars, Ferrari’s and Bentleys mostly, parked on double lines ( a no parking zone). A traffic warden slaps some parking tickets on their screen (£100 per go) and Dougie Wallace asks if they ever get towed away. No they don’t, apparently they could tow them, but never do because they once damaged the wing of some £1.5 million super car and the council were billed. Park on double lines in your Ford and you’ll get towed for sure.
In that shot above I suddenly realised that Louis has dropped his lust for weaponry; Swords, Guns, Bows & Arrows etc and is now fascinated with machinery and engineering, specifically cars, he loved this McLaren. The liveliest I saw him all day was when he spotted a Ferrari showroom in Berkley Square. Amélie was listening out for the “Nightingale that sung in….” (I must stop the musical links!).
I detest wandering around shops, that’s all I’m saying and we’ll leave my views there. Sam and the Children love it for some inexplicable reason. We went into Harrods, my mum used to work in the Harrods restaurant during the early 1950’s, a different place then, allegedly you could buy a Lion in the Pet Department. It’s a big store, employs around 5,000 people and my mum tells me that in the underground storage area there are Street names to help staff not to get lost. We didn’t get a Lion, eventually though we bought a takeaway sandwich and sat outside to eat it. I’ll add that the bread was stale. At this point I’d like to advise you that a lot of these photos are purely documenting our day out, not in any way am I suggesting they’re anything special, rather like that Harrods sandwich lurking in Sam’s carrier bag:
Next stop, back on the tube to Piccadilly Circus. I remember standing there with my dad, late 1960’s. He told me that if you stay there for 30 minutes you’re bound to come across someone you know. Within minutes a waiter friend of his turned up. I’m fairly sure he’d already arranged to see that guy whilst we were in London…I’ll never know, but it’s stuck with me. He’s full of stuff like that, outside the hotel we were staying in on one trip they must have recently resurfaced the pavement. It had a yellow look and they’d added some grit to the mix which sparkled as the sun caught it. “I told you the streets were paved with gold “ he said…that’s stuck with me too, he had a way of making things magical for that little boy. We walked up Piccadilly and entered Fortnum & Masons, purveyors of fine food and gifts. Personally I think it’s a much better proposition than Harrods Food Hall. Sam bought some macaroons and gave Amélie (our food critic) one to try. As we walked past the Fortnum & Masons Floor Manager she announced “These aren’t nearly as nice as the ones we had in Paris”. He looked down his nose and frowned, caught my eye and decided to smile. Of course we’re still in an other world here, a million miles from reality. This lady was arranging easter eggs, just regular sized ones and a snip at £98 each! As I say, another world.
Onward then. My sister and her family were in London that day too, celebrating her birthday. Perhaps I shouldn’t have told Louis and stood at Piccadilly Circus with him as my dad had with me, I’m not my dad, never will be that good. We walked past a restaurant and I grabbed a shot of the doorman:
Hold on I said, isn’t this where my sister is having lunch today. I wandered inside and was told they hadn’t arrived yet, but the table was booked. We waited for ten minutes and surprised my sister, brother -in-law, nephew and his partner as they walked up Piccadilly. The children adore their Auntie Jane and Uncle Geoff. That woman with the phone in the foreground had nothing to do with us, perhaps she just wanted to be in a photograph.
We left them to enjoy their lunch and walked past the usual restaurants and on past the Ritz. I don’t know why anybody would sit in a Caviar restaurant and look at their phone, but there you are, it takes all sorts to make up a world. You can tell I’m beginning to think more of Street Photography than documenting our trip.
Not great Street Photography either , but I grabbed what I could. That couple by the bus stop were looking for directions on an app…we had me instead. Occasionally I’m not the best and believe me Sam lets me know, I won’t say we argue, let’s just say a lively discussion about direction takes place whenever we’re in a city. Thankfully I knew exactly where I was and Sam wanted to be in Mayfair. Cross the road, next right and we were there which is where I’d got that shot of Louis pointing to a Ferrari Dealership. There are never that many people walking around Mayfair on a Sunday, but I have to say the ones you do see are interesting characters. For example this Ninja Photographer:
and these people awaiting the arrival of the Stars at a Film Premier outside the Curzon Cinema, Mayfair:
We stopped off in a pub where I had a half pint of beer (lesson learnt from my earlier anecdote) and walked over to Oxford Street, which I’ve always thought of as the same as any High Street in the country, same shops, same people, pointless. The reason for this was to allow Amélie and Louis to visit the Disney Store. I languished outside, which is exactly what I did when we were at the same store on the Champs-Élysées in Paris not too many months ago. Just saying! I simply waited and watched the people go by, which I’m guaranteed to enjoy:
Eventually they emerged, Amélie with a costume of whatever she’s currently mad about. One thing that hasn’t changed is her obsession with all things Harry Potter. Don’t ever get her talking about it, seriously you’ll fall into a coma as she recounts every detail from every film and every book. Secretly she still believes that she’s going to get a letter from Hogwarts when she’s eleven years old and she’ll become the next Hermione Granger. Time to make our way home. Hop on to another tube from Oxford Street to the Science Museum which was near to where our journey began and our car was parked:
We changed trains and then realised that the Circle Line was closed for repairs which would suggest that we wouldn’t be arriving any time soon at our destination. So we got off at the next station, by now tired and I feel as though we’d all had enough. I hailed a Taxi and we drove the remaining mile, which was a shame because we could have walked past the birthplace of Queen Victoria, Kensington Palace, another day perhaps. Finally we were getting to something interesting, the children had requested the Science Museum when we left home that morning. We went in and let’s just say they weren’t overawed by it. I was when I saw the Lunar Module and Buzz Aldrins space suit. For a boy who is now fascinated by engineering and design Louis was bored. Actually I think exhausted would be a better word. I took a shot of him and attempted, not successfully, to take a selfie in Buzz’s visor, I was tired too. Those guys went to the moon and back, I’d just walked around London. We headed for home.
A great day out, even if I can’t take that hanging around the shops business. It didn’t cost the earth and we’re going back to London very soon. In fact a few times this year are planned, I’m reliably informed that next time there’ll be very little shopping involved and historical places of interest will be visited. That’s if the world hasn’t ended from an ecological disaster or we’re all dead from a virus. In three weeks time we’ll be in New York for a short trip. So to finish the musical link, the children will have been to “New York, London, Paris, Munich, everybody talk about Pop Muzik”! Oh yes, not Munich, but still close enough. If you were around in 1979 to hear that cheesy track you’ll get that, if you weren’t don’t bother looking it up, not the best representative of 70’s music to be fair. Any way, New York here I come…”Start spreading the news….”. Didn’t I say I’d leave those musical quotes? As they say, here’s one I made earlier:
As always my sincere thanks go to anyone taking the time to read this blog.
All images can be opened by clicking on the thumbnails and are taken using a Leica M with Summicron 28mm Lens fitted. Apart from that one from New York - 35mm.
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