St. Dunstan's

This day found us in the downtown core of the city visiting some interesting sites including St. Dunstan-in-the-East Church Garden, the Monument to the Great Fire of London, and Leadenhall Market.

Great London Fire Monument.
The fire took place in 1666.
The monument was erected a few
years later.

The Walkie-Talkie

The Shard

The ruins of St. Dunstan's

St. Dunstan's church tower

Leadenhall Market.  The market dates from the 14th century.
The current structure dates from 1881.

Chocolate cramiques at Aux Merveilleux.  Mmmm...

Aux Merveilleux Patisserie in Leadenhall

St. Paul's

 

Hampstead Cemetery

After venturing up to West Hampstead this afternoon and enjoying some raisin rugelach and coconut macaroons from Roni's, our favorite Jewish bakery, we chanced upon the atmospheric Hampstead Cemetery and wandered its sepulchral paths.

Primrose Hill

Today we wandered the lovely streets of Primrose Hill, a charming little neighborhood tucked away between Chalk Farm and the upper reaches of Regent's Park.  Several wordsmiths of note once resided here: Irish poet William Butler Yeats, and doomed literary couple Sylvia Plath (American poet and author of The Bell Jar) & Ted Hughes (Poet Laureate of the UK from 1984 to 1998).

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

W. B. Yeats

Yeats House.  He was homeschooled here as a boy.

Blue Plaque on the Hughes/Plath residence. 
In 1961 Sylvia relocated to the W. B. Yeats house around
the block (first photo) where she tragically
took her own life in 1963.

The Hughes/Plath residence (until 1961)

Chalcot Square

Fresh veggies!

City view from the apex of the hill.

Primrose Hill florist

In the circus tent of a hurricane

designed by a drunken god

my extravagant heart blows up again

in a rampage of champagne-colored rain

and the fragments whir like a weather vane

while the angels all applaud.

-Sylvia Plath (from Circus in Three Rings)

London Transport Museum

Located in the heart of Covent Garden, the wonderful London Transport Museum relates the history of London's myriad modes of transport, from horse-drawn jitney to modern tube.  The city's Underground system has a staggering 270 stations!

All aboard!

Old time train compartment

The museum's great hall with its collection of
antique buses.

Vintage poster

Room for one more!

Commandeering a bus!