Staying Indoors

It's too wet to go outdoors at present.  Yes I know you can get great rain pictures but I'm preferring to stay warm and dry thanks.

Caught in the Storm

Thunder and lightening, torrential rain; not a good start to summer.

A Really Old Pub

It is essential to visit a pub when visiting London, preferably one steeped in history.

Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese certainly fits the bill.  The original pub was burnt down in the Great Fire, but a new one quickly replaced it just one year later.

When we popped in yesterday a coal fire was smouldering in the hearth adding to the atmosphere.  You half expected to see Dickens sitting in the corner as he often did and he alluded to in "A tale of Two Cities".  He was just one of many great literary figures who frequented this pub, Twain, Goldsmith, Tennyson and Dr Johnson were some of the others who took a tipple at this establishment.

As with many of London's old establishments this one has its ghost story too.  In a tale told in 1680 a midwife haunted the house until the new residents were induced to dig up the bones of the illegtiimate children she had "done away with" and buried in the cellar.  Probably just a fantastical story, but gets better after a couple of beers. 

The Devil Tavern

Could there possibly be any link between the actions and behaviours that we now know emanated unchecked from the News of the world, and the nature of the first building at No.1 Fleet street?.  The street that is famous as once being the London centre of the newspaper empires and media barons.

Monopoly - Fleet St

Monopoly red square. £220.

I've missed a corner square. Free parking. I couldn't find any in London!
Fleet St named after the Fleet river that now runs under it. In medieval times this river ran alongside London's wall. Close to Temple and the Knights of Templar.
Still an area of the legal fraternity. The Royal Courts of Justice the magnificent building in the photo.
Also famous for years as the newspaper street whose offices were all here until the 1980's.

Fleet St

A quiet afternoon in Fleet Street