The London skyline

Normally I would have spent today walking in the Highgate/Hampstead area to orient myself. I don't know North London as well as the south-west though I did flat not far from Hampstead once. But today's mission was to get a SIM card for which I needed to get the tube into the Strand. So once I was central (and because there is another tube strike on Thursday which would make it a good day for walking locally) I decided to blow the long-flight cobwebs away and catch a ferry down the Thames to Greenwich.

One thing that struck me again on the river is how unbeautiful London is. It doesn't have the glistening white symmetry of Paris or the sense of centre that gives many big cities a focus. London sprawls like the joined up series of villages it is and the post-war architecture, which increasingly crowds out the older buildings, is often very ugly. But what makes it exciting is the juxtaposition of new and old - that unlovely hodge-podge that makes the city endlessly fascinating.

The river was a good place from which to view some of these juxtapositions.

Not from the river.

...

The Shard

Not from the river.

The Queen's House, Greenwich

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