The London Traveler

I’ve just taken a trip into Jack the Ripper’s London.
You can do this, of course, by taking one of the Jack the Ripper walking tours of Whitechapel – though there’s relatively little of Victorian Whitechapel left, and I’ve grown to love the area rather for its thriving street market and excellent curry shops.
But I did it by opening up writer Alan Moore’s From Hell, a brooding graphic novel starkly illustrated by Eddie Campbell.
Moore takes one of the numerous outlandish theories surrounding the Ripper – that he was actually William Gull, the Queen’s Surgeon – and spins it into a yarn …read more

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Not a lot of ancient London is left. You won’t find much in the City, of course, because the Great Fire of 1666 destroyed most of it – there are a couple of medieval churches left, but little else predates Sir Christopher Wren’s rebuilding. And in the West End, most of the older buildings have been replaced by more fashionable and up-to-date edifices.
If you want to see older buildings your best bet is to take a day trip; to Norwich for instance (less than two hours by train from Liverpool Street) or Cambridge (just over an hour from King’s Cross).
But …read more

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I’m not particularly into old blocks of stone. People have shown me ruins of priories, ruins of castles, ruins of palaces, and they usually leave me cold.
But there are two remnants of ancient London within a few minutes’ walk of each other that really do make me stop and wonder. They’re both in the middle of the modern City – between office blocks and busy roads – and they both hark back to London’s most ancient past.
First, the Mithraeum, in Queen Victoria Street. It’s actually been resited since it was discovered – it was found in Walbrook, the other side …read more

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I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw this from the top of a bus. I had to blink hard, rub my eyes, and look again – and even then I thought I was hallucinating.
The Black Cat cigarette factory was built here in 1928 – just after Tutankhamun’s tomb had been discovered, and in the middle of a fad for all things Egyptian. It’s a marvellous, Egyptian-influenced façade, but it’s also one of the first applications of pre-stressed concrete to an industrial building in London – hence the huge windows that make the façade so dramatic.
The two huge cats …read more

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“They’re changing the guard at Buckingham Palace
Christopher Robin went down with Alice” -
a couplet I’ll always remember from my bedtime story when I was a little girl. They’re still doing it, of course, and even if we Londoners tend to be a bit sniffy about this particular piece of our heritage, it remains one of those things you just have to do.
But to get the most out of it, you can’t just turn up. First of all, in winter – until the end of March – it’s only every other day. Over the summer, it will be daily. And it …read more

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Just in front of St Mary Aldermary, in Watling Street in the City, is this statue of a cordwainer – a leatherworker.
In the medieval City, just as in an Arabic souk today, each trade had its own particular streets. This was the shoe and bootmaking area, and it’s still called Cordwainer ward (a district of local government).
The word ‘cordwainer’ is derived from the name of the city of Cordoba in Spain, which was renowned for its fine leatherwork.
You can see another more famous cordwainer outside the nearby church of St Mary le Bow. He may have started as a mere …read more

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Half way down High Holborn is one of my favourite pubs in London – the Cittie of Yorke.
It’s a lovely traditional pub – if I was visiting London and only had time for a single pub, I think this would be the one.
The creamy stone Gothic facade should tip you off that this is something quite special. Go in and if you don’t stop in the front bar, with its wood panelling, go down the passageway and at the back you’ll find a massive hall, with a fine high timbered ceiling and a row of enormous beer barrels over the …read more

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If you plan on coming to London in late March, there is one event that you shouldn’t miss… the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race.
This is a very unique sporting event, and is one of the oldest inter-collegiate sporting events in the world. Back in 1829, a Cambridge student challenged an Oxford student (and a friend) to a rowing race between the two schools. Since the 1860’s, it has been held on the River Thames, and continues to be raced annually. (Though it wasn’t during the two World Wars.) These days, it is one of the premier …read more

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There is one exclusive ceremony in London that, with prior planning, anyone can experience. That event is the Ceremony of the Keys at the Tower of London.
This ceremony has been performed daily for around seven hundred years. Originally a very practical event, where the Tower was locked every evening, it is now a very private ceremony. The ceremony has in fact never been photographed. (There are one or two photographs that have been taken, but those were of practice ceremonies.) It takes just around five to ten minutes, and is really quite simple.
A …read more

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Everyone that visits London should visit the Tower of London. Built initially by William the Conquerer nearly a thousand years ago, it has served as a home for kings, a zoo, an armory, a prison (with torture devices), an execution site, and now as the home of the Crown Jewels. You can check out a lot more history of the Tower of London on its Wikipedia page.
The Tower is one of the best tourist attractions in London. There’s history, the highly entertaining Beefeaters (Yeoman Warders), the Crown Jewels, and more. I highly recommend planning to spend …read more

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