Thursday, May 07, 2009

Greenwich

Chris (Hi Chris) has up and moved to Greenwich. In celebration of this fact, Mark and I strapped on our watches and headed eastward this past Saturday.

Greenwich is located in southeast London. The quickest way to get there is by overground train, which leave from various stations in the city center. For some reason they run from Cannon Street on the middle of a Saturday, despite the fact that Cannon Street Station is located in the City of London, where everything is closed on Saturdays and there are no people around. Anyways, Greenwich station is about 10 minutes from Cannon Street, so tis a short little journey!

To get to Chris's new pad, we walked through the main bit of Greenwich. It was a warm sunny Saturday and the place was admittedly a bit of a zoo. The main attractions of the area, in addition to general cuteness, are the National Maritime Museum and the Royal Observatory (the clock place, I think). These two attractions are in close proximity to each other within the larger compounds of Greenwich Park, which is really big. Greenwich is on the river, and the area near the Thames is flat and hosts the Maritime Museum in majestically large spread out buildings connected by covered walkways. Behind this a massive hill emerges (it's really no wonder it's a park, it would have been very difficult to put much else up there!), on top of which is the observatory. The main bit of the town is between the park and the station and is made up of shops and restaurants.

So we didn't go to the museum or the observatory, but we did grab Chris and stop by Tesco to get some grab and ate al fresco in the park. This was followed by a jaunt through the main bit of town before returning to Chris's.

It was the first time in Greenwich for both of us and in general we were quite impressed. While I suppose if you are a big boat or clock person the appeal would be obvious, the views of London from the park in and of itself should also serve as a draw for visitors. I took some photos of this view but Mark has possession of my camera at 'the cricket' today so you'll have to do your best to visualize! In general, Greenwich is what I would term a second tier tourist attraction, but likely worth a visit if the weather is nice!

1 comment:

mom said...

We are counting on some nice weather for our visit. It has been pouring here, and I mean pouring. The upside is that everything is nice and clean. The downside is that it's not very cheerful.

Does Chris (Hi Chris) have a nice flat?