Walking across bridges

LONDON BRIDGES WALK (LINEAR)

Wednesday, 4 January 2017

Start time: 10:00

Moderate 12 miles / 19.3 km

Group South Bank

At a moderate to fast pace, starting at Tower Bridge on the north bank and walking westwards along the riverside crossing bridges for as long as we feel inclined. Stopping for refreshments along the way. Drop out points.

In my hurry to get to the meeting point in time, I left behind my hat, gloves - and camera. Which restricted photography, as we were walking briskly and navigating to the camera on the phone is a slower business than just whipping out my little Lumix.

Tower Bridge

Heading west and looking across  to the City

My geography of bridges across the Thames was shaky, and still is. A list is here: I don't have photos of all that we crossed, nor did we cross them all (left out Waterloo Bridge and Hungerford Bridge ... and possibly another?).

Southwark Bridge (1921); at low tide you can see pilings of old docks

Sculpture under the north end of Millennium Bridge (2000)
(no time to stop and read about it!)

Along the South Bank - the London Eye

Looking west and hoping the rainclouds are dispersing

Photoshoot on Westminster Bridge (1862)

Obelisk at the north end of Lambeth Bridge (1932)

Restaurant boat left high and dry by the tide

Battersea Power Station under redevelopment

Chelsea Bridge (1937) came under discussion as the location of a book
no-one could remember the title or author of (it wasn't Offshore)

Lunch stop at Battersea Park's Pear Tree cafe, beside the boating lake

Albert Bridge (1873)

Statue of Whistler at the north end of Battersea Bridge - he famously
painted the old bridge (Nocturne in Blue and Gold) in the early 1870s

The walk continued over Battersea Bridge (1890) but I dropped out
and headed for Imperial Wharf overground station

A Whistlerian type of river scene

A jumble of walkways to the houseboats

Along Cheyne Walk, a plethora of blue plaques, among them these -

Artist William Greaves and (prolific) writer Hilaire Belloc

Painter Philip Wilson Steer next door to sculptor John Tweed

Suffragist Sylvia Pankhurst
(her daughter-in-law was my boss in my 1980s library job)

This mirrored contraption -

gives a view of the river through the skylights -

On past Lots Road Power Station, now derelict and being redeveloped -

Much building in the Chelsea Wharf area -