SOUTHAMPTON was a largest city in south coast of England. It has so much of history with it and was considered as gateway to the world by Britain people; because it was a major trading place with major port and ships starts from here to others countries of the world. It has been an important port since the Roman occupation of Britain.
For example, RMS Titanic started her maiden voyage from the port of Southampton with more than 2000 members onboard to New York city. Today in this city we could see lots of memorials for peoples died on Titanic, for engineers who built the Titanic and a dedicated museum for it. Not only Titanic, there were so many historical British ships like Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth I, Mayflower ships started their journey from Southampton to cross Atlantic Ocean.
Titanic Engineer's memorial
Memorial for people died on Titanic
The apartment I stayed was very near to the ports and I could see many cruise ships coming there daily. To name few, I saw Queen Mary II, Ocean Cruise, P & O Cruise
P & O Cruise
Queen Mary II
Southampton during Medieval period:
During medieval period (between 5th to 15 century), the city was a fortified city protected by walls to safeguard people and the import & export goods. This city faced so much of destructions during WW I & WW II.
Bargate which was once the main entrance to the city
Northern Wall
Since this city was an important place for trading with the world, many merchants setup their residence here for trading during medieval period. Most of the old houses were destroyed during war and few over the time. Today the city still maintain one such merchant home for public visiting.
Old merchant house
Same merchant home
There was one more similar house called Tudor house, this house has history from 12th century and was a dwelling place for Normans. During 15th century, the Royal family used it for supplying foods for navy. Later during 16th century used as business place by one ship owner.
Infront of Tudor house
International Food Street
Every Friday and Saturday we could see world cuisines in High Street and Above Bar Street in Southampton. Chefs from different parts of the world prepares their food and delights Southampton people. Obviously I saw stalls from India with dishes like Samosa, Madras Chicken, Kaati roll, rice and more. All these shop will be closed by 5:00 pm .
International Food Streets
County flag on top of their Stall
Apart from this, if we want to try international food all over the week then we could go to oxford street, here we could see many restaurants which serves cuisines of the world. Both the sides of the street were filled with restaurants and the platform of the road was so wide that they have table on it.
Oxford Street
Bike Nights
UK people has more craze on bike riding. They do not drive for normal commutation but drive as a passion. There were so many biker clubs and the members meets at one particular place and starts their ride from there. In Southampton there was a biker club and people meet at Bargate area and start from there every Thursday night.
Assembled in Bargate area
Boat show in Southampton
Every year in Southampton, the boatshow use to happen in Mayflower park. The main theme of this show was to exhibit and showcase different ships, yacht and other accessories necessary for ship by ship makers.
In front of one of the Yachts kept for display
47th Boatshow in Mayflower park
As a part of Boatshow, there was aquarium, giant wheel, boat riding and much more. One such thing they arranged was air show and we did enjoy the performance of pilots in the air.
LONDON, one of the busiest, one of the world's leading financial hub and the most visited city in the world with over two thousands years of history in it.
Even we spend 365 days in London, we could not fully experience and enjoy what the city offers. Fortunately I got at least 12 hours of my time to be spent in this spectacular city and I wanted to use the best of best from it.
The good way to plan is to fully browse the http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/ and shortlist the places to visit or book a tour package before arriving the city.
Since I love cycling, I booked my tour in a 'Fat Tire Bike Tour'; there were also walking tour, private taxi tour, bus tour etc., If we were visiting the city for the first time, do not know anyone here and we have to roam alone then the better option would be to book a tour. The group tour make us feel we are not alone and makes us more comfortable in new place and also we can cover more sites in short time.
One important thing to note is to find from which part of the city these tours are started, the connectivity within the city is extraordinary but the point is we should consider the travel time required to reach the given location within the time.
Packing my things for a day trip
Must have things
Printed city tube map (freely downloadable from internet)
Printed city bus map (freely downloadable from internet)
Wallet with some money ;)
Mobile & SIM card with data pack
ID proof
Good to have
Drinking water
Some snacks
Umbrella
Towel
Mobile charger
With my personal bag I arrived Victoria Coach station, London at 8:00 AM in the morning. The weather was very cold and it drizzled too. I finished my breakfast inside the bus itself so I should head directly to Queensway tube station where the bike tour supposed to start.
Notes:
Victoria coach station is the bus stand.
In London, the underground metros train are called as tube and station is called as tube station.
The Victoria terminal can be seen similar to Majestic terminal in Bangalore. Like Majestic, here we have the bus station, tube station and inter-city train station very adjacent to each other. By walk I went to Victoria tube station, this tube station have multiple entries and the one entered was not so great in look and has narrow pathways. When I entered I got the feel of entering Mumbai or Chennai electric train station. There were self-help ticketing kiosk and the traditional counter too. Either we should buy oyster card OR we could buy one day pass which can be used both in tube and bus. The difference between oyster card and pass was oyster card itself is charged but we can surrender when we no longer need it and get the refund.In London city bus, the driver will not take cash for ticket, so buying an oyster or pass is mandatory.
One of the tube stations
I purchased one day pass and took train which would take me to Queensway tube station.
A Guy was waiting for us with Bike Tour board in Queenway tube station
Once all the people who booked for the tour were arrived, we went to the 'Fat tire bike tour' office. After going there I got to know, they have offices in France, Spain & Germany too. We were totally 20 people and they divided in two groups and assigned different guide for each group. Each one of us picked one bike and went to nearby Kennington park.
1. Kennington Garden
London city has numerous number of parks and they have dedicated cycling track in park as well as in road. Our guide asked us to get used to the bike for few mins in this park. They have mixed varieties of UK and US bikes; in UK bikes the gear and back wheel break in left and front wheel break in right, for US the reverse. Guide was carrying all the necessary tools with him all the times.
After getting comfortable with our bikes, we started for the tour !!!!
Started our tour :)
2. Kensington Palace
The Kensington palace was not built with the intention as royal residence. In the beginning of 17th century, wealthy business man constructed this mansion far away from central London. In late 17th century the King wanted to stay away from the crowded and smoky air of London so he purchased this mansion. That time Kensington was a suburban village outside London. Queen Victoria was born and brought up in this Palace. Today Prince William and Kate were staying here. This palace has two parts, one is accessible to public while the other is used only by the royal family.
Kensington Palace's Main Entrance
Queen Victoria coronation statue
The above coronation statue of queen Victoria is designed by Princess Louise, daughter of Queen Victoria.
3. Wellington Arch
The Wellington arch was built between 1826 to 1830 to commemorate the Britain's victory in Napoleonic Wars at the battle of Waterloo. The location of current arch was short distance away from where it was originally installed and the statue on the top was replaced. There was statue of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington but in 1912 it was replaced by statue the Quadriga, the winged Goddess of victory. This Quadriga is the largest bronze statue in Europe.
Standing infront of Wellington Arch
4. Buckingham Palace
Next place were we stopped was Buckingham palace which was the home of British Queen and state rooms. The guide questioned us whether the queen was in home at the moment, we gave mixed answers. After our answers, he told us a way to find out this. If a UK flag was flying then queen was not in home, if royal standard flag was flying then it means queen was in home. Guide told us about the story of Michael Fagan, the Buckingham palace intruder who broke into the palace and entered Queen Elizabeth II's bedroom in 1982.
In Buckingham Palace
5. Trafalgar Square
Next we headed to Trafalgar square and parked our bike for lunch. There were lots of restaurants and sandwich shops for either having a lengthy, casual lunch or quick lunch. He gave us 45 mins time to finish our food. The main attraction was the Nelson's column. It was built to commemorate the victory of British's naval forces during the Napoleonic Wars over France and Spain. The four bronze relief panels on four sides of the column were cast from captured French guns.
Trafalgar Square
Bronze panel made from cast of captured French guns
Really I should appreciate the guide for explaining us how British has defeated French and Spanish ships even though the British had less number of war ships. He asked us stand in the same naval formation commanded by Admiral Nelson during the battle and made us understand the British's naval tactics during 18th century.
Infront of Nelson's Column
6. Horse Guard Parade
Horse guard for Buckingham palace starts from Whitehall everyday at 11:30 AM. Since we went after lunch, we could not see the change of guard ceremony. I noticed signal for horses too in London like how it used to be for pedestrians and cyclist.
Whitehall Palace
Above: Not the actual horse guard, the actual guard will be with uniform Below: The actual horse guard for palace
Next to Whitehall was #10 Downing Street, the British Prime Minister's home and office. Just adjacent to it was Churchill's war room where he discussed all his world war II war plan.
7. Westminister Abbey
Westminister abbey is a large church in city of Westminister, London. It has been the traditional place of coronation and burial site for British monarchs. Princess Diana's funeral was held at this abbey.
Westminister Abbey
Though the narrow streets of London
8. Westminister Palace
It is called House of Parliament and the meeting place for both House of commons and Lords. It was the primary residence of England King until the fire accident happened in 16th century. After reconstructing the Westminister Palace they started using it for Parliament. The design they wanted to adopt was to completely move out of Roman design with dome structure; the primary reason for this was US was already having their Federal Government building with dome and UK wants to be different from them.
Westminister Palace
A part of Westminister palace was the Elizabeth tower which was commonly called as Big Ben after the name of its main bell. It was one of the iconic landmark for London.
Big Ben
9. Victoria and Albert Museum
This was the last site for our bike tour, after this we went back to Queensway tube via St James Park, Hyde Park and that concludes our bike tour. On the way we stopped for photo shots in this beautiful gardens. All around London, we could find plenty of museums. Few are free and most of them are charged. Each museum will take atleast half a day of time.
Lake in Hyde Park
Infront of Victoria and Albert Museum
10. London Eye
London eye was a giant Ferris wheel located in southern bank of River Thames and started operation from 31st Dec'1999 to mark the millennium. During 1999, it was the world's tallest Ferris wheel. It provides highest viewing point in London but we need to stand in a big queue for that. The speed of rotation was very slow and the whole ride takes 30 mins.
Standing in Westminister bridge and infront of London Eye
11. Tower of London
It was a castle and in history it even served a prison. Today they have a museum here and kept Crown Jewels which has India's Kohinoor diamond, the 106 carat diamond. Each and every stone in the crown has its own history.
12. London tower Bridge
Ofcourse how one can miss Tower bridge when visiting London. It was next to Tower of London and crosses river Thames and was one of the iconic symbol of London and to UK itself.
Infront of London Tower bridge
I was a little bit lucky enough to see the lifting of bridge for boat to pass through. The bridge lifting time will be published in their official website.
Panoramic view of Tower of London, Tower bridge & modern building in Southern bank of Thames
There was an exhibit in towers of tower bridge but it was chargeable. Pedestrians can walk on the bridge and we could see the engine room in southern bank. I enjoyed the view of wide Thames from the bridge.
Snap on the bridge
In the southern bank we could see live musical performance, lots of shops and restaurants. We could sit for sometime and get relaxed after seeing the flow of Thames.
In Southern bank with the view of Tower of London on Northern Bank
13. Borough market
Borough market was one of the oldest wholesale and retail food market in London. Here we could see stallholders from different parts of UK. Almost all the shops get closed at 5:00 pm, so if we would like to shop some food better to go soon.
Main entrance of Borough Market
14. Victoria Railway station
Victoria is one of the busiest railway station in London. This Victoria station structure resembles our Mumbai's CST, I should have told in reverse order ;) its ok :p
Victoria Railway Station in London
Bye Bye London, see you again
After exploring this historical city for the whole day, I said bye with hard emotionsand reached Victoria Coach station. From here all inter-city bus departs.
Victoria Coach station
I saw River Thames again on my way out of London :)
