Tower Bridge

Think of a London landmark.......

Got one? Okay, what was it? The Eye? The Gherkin? St. Pauls? Big Ben? (don't bother, pedants) I'm willing to wager many of you would have picked Tower Bridge, and not just because I've shoved a great big picture of it in your face. It is, truly, iconic; recognised the world over as a symbol not just of London but also the Victorians that built it. But why build it? The river Thames is the life blood of London but it is also a significant barrier. In the mid 19th century east London had become one of the largest ports in the world and there was a commensurate explosion in it's population; in fact, from 1831-1925 it had a higher population than any other city on Earth. All these people obviously needed to get around and at this point there was no crossing further west than London bridge; there was no Rotherhithe tunnel, Dartford tunnel or QEII bridge although the Blackwall tunnel wasn't far behind, it opened in 1897. This bottleneck led to massive congestion and journey times of several hours to cross the river. But it wasn't simply a matter of throwing up a standard issue bridge; this was one of the busiest ports in the world and the design had to allow for the passage of ships of all berths; with this in mind the City of London Corporation opened the design process to public competition.

Over 8 years fifty designs were submitted before one that fulfilled the stringent criteria was settled upon and the successful architect was one Horace Jones in collaboration with John Wolfe Barry. This was not without controversy however. Although there were submissions from established and proven engineers like Joseph Bazalgette, who designed the Victorian sewer system that I mentioned in a previous post, Jones' design was deemed the best. The only problem was that Jones himself was on the judging panel; so no conflict of interest there, then. Bazalgette didn't do too badly though, the Hammersmith bridge is one of his. Having muscled his way into the contract Jones actually died only one year into construction at which point George D. Stevenson took over, and that's probably a good thing. Jones' original design was merely to clad the structure in brick, it was Stevenson that decided to clad it in Cornish granite and Portland stone and add in the neo-Gothic elements that are very much a part of it's character to this day.

Right, let's break out some stats. 70,000 tons of concrete went into sinking the two piles beneath the towers, which themselves, combined with the walkways, needed 11,000 tons of steel to be completed. It's actually three bridges in one; two suspension bridges linked by a bascule bridge (bascule being French for see saw). Prior to 1976 the bascules were operated by steam power, the steam was collected in 6 accumulators so that there was always sufficient power at hand whenever a boat needed to get through. This was the most sophisticated design in the world at the time and meant that it only took about 60 seconds to raise the bascules to their maximum 86 degree elevation. The walkway across the top exists solely so that foot passengers could continue to cross the river when boats were passing but, due to lack of use, they were actually closed 16 years after opening. They were reopened again for tourists in 1982.

A panorama from the centre of the bridge. From left to right you have City Hall, the Shard, HMS Belfast, Tower 42, the Gherkin and the Tower of London. Click to en-awesomify.

The history of this bridge has not been without incident, no less than three planes have been flown between the bascules and the walkway; firstly, in 1912 pioneering avaitor Frank McLean flew down the Thames in a seaplane but, to the consternation of the local constabulary, he flew underneath London bridge and between the walkway and bascules of Tower Bridge. The second time was by an RAF pilot that was annoyed by a lack of celebration for the organisation's 50th birthday in 1968 and the last time was in 1973 when a somewhat unstable stockbroker pulled off the feat twice before flying on to the Lake District and killing himself as his plane crashed. And let's not forget the incident when a number 78 bus found itself rather near the gap as the bridge began to rise. The driver, Albert Gunton, took the split second decision to floor it and jump the small gap that had opened up.

My trips to the bridge have not been so eventful, I've never even seen it raised up, not for the lack of visiting though. Tower Bridge marks either the start or end point of possibly my favourite walk in all of London which basically consists of a loop along the north and south banks crossing at Tower Bridge and Westminster and I walk it regularly. The photos in this post are from two separate trips about two weeks apart. The daytime ones were taken on a random day off earlier in March and the night time ones were a couple of weeks earlier after a particularly crappy day at work; I was feeling rather stressed and could think of no better way to chill out than to go and visit one of my old buddies. I had wanted to get the sundial and fountain shots for a long time, unfortunately I was there at completely the wrong time of day so I was shooting into the sun. I need to go back in the early morning to get the best light for this direction.

I've also thrown in a picture of the Shard just because I've become slightly obsessed with that building. I can't wait for it to be completed and the viewing deck to be opened up to the public, the views will be spectacular - eleven months and counting. The last picture is clearly a long exposure but it's not the best as my tripod wasn't high enough to see over the railings so I had to do it handheld, which was less than ideal. Still, it leaves me something to aim for when I inevitably return, for return I will. This talismanic structure is, quite literally, one of my favourite places on the planet and I'm always excited to see it, like an old friend that I haven't seen or heard from for a year or two, but I know that time and distance won't have diminished our relationship. A lot of water may have flowed under the bridge but my love of this city grows stronger and for me there is no greater emblem of this than my old friend, the Victorian masterpiece, Tower Bridge.

The City of Dreaming Spires

The gatehouse into Balliol College. I've added a bit more definition to the sky in post processing

When I was a mere slip of a lad, still but a teenager, I met a rather compelling young lady. On her 21st birthday we shared our first kiss and so it was, nine years later, that I thought it might be a good idea to take her away somewhere nice for her birthday. These are the circumstances that led us to Oxford, a city we had wanted to visit for sometime.

Oxford is just an hour from London by train and very much a part of the commuter belt. It's rather well to do and when children are chastised their parents quietly implore names such as Toby and Jemima rather than loudly screech Jamie and Stacey. Oxford was first settled in late Saxon times, in the 10th century, and you won't be surprised to hear that it got that name because it was the location of a ford through which oxen were driven. Exactly which river I'm not certain of; Oxford is where the Thames links up with one of it's major tributaries, the river Cherwell.

Like most towns of any note the Normans built their trademark motte and bailey castle to help secure the conquest, however, it was never actually used as a military installation; rather, a community of monks set up shop there. Probably it's greatest claim to fame was that this was where Geoffrey of Monmouthshire was when he wrote his Historia Regum Britanniae, the source of the King Arthur legend.

The Thames before it gets all Londoned up.

But what Oxford is undoubtedly now most famous for is it's university. The first colleges of the university; University College, Balliol and Merton, were set up in 1249, 1263 & 1264 respectively. If you just stop and think about that for a moment you may appreciate just how astonishing a fact that is. These colleges are nearly eight hundred years old. That pre-dates Henry VIII, the Hundred Years War, Geoffrey Chaucer and the entire Aztec Empire.

The history of Oxford has mostly been calm but it gets much more involved in the story of Britain in the 1640s. During the Civil War Charles I held his court in Oxford for four years until it succumbed to siege in 1646. Later his son, Charles II, would temporarily move the court back there from London to avoid the plague of 1665-6.

One common theme that seems to run through much of Oxford is the name John Radcliffe. I was already familiar with the name as there is a John Radcliffe Hospital that often sends samples to us for genetic analysis (I work in a genetics lab). But there's also a John Radcliffe Observatory, a John Radcliffe Library, a Radcliffe Quad and the John Radcliffe Camera, more of which later.

Our itinerary was vague and mostly consisted of a generalised plan to stroll through colleges, walk along the river and sit in cafes. The weather on Friday and Saturday was mixed; bouts of stormy looking clouds were interspersed with glorious sunshine. We set off into town to get a feel for the place and orientate ourselves; the centre was very much like most others in England, it had all the usual shops but they did that thing where they have to have the toned down version of their shop fronts so that most of them are nondescript greens and browns.

Our first port of call was Balliol College, pictured at the top; they certainly know how to do a good quadrangle and no mistake. Most colleges are partially or entirely restricted to the public at different times and this was no exception. The quads and chapel were accessible but not the library or grand hall, which was a pity because just as we got there it started to rain rather heavily and we could really have done with the cover.

A highlight was the Ashmolean Museum which was conveniently situated exactly opposite our hotel. This new, purpose built building was opened in 2009 by Her Majesty the Queen and has galleries on ancient Egypt and Greece, Asia and also on Europe from pre-historic times through to the Renaissance. The museum is named after Elias Ashmole who donated much of his extensive collections to the university on the proviso that they build a suitable venue for their display to the public. Ashmole was what we would probably call a polymath; his interests included alchemy, astrology and antiquities and he also found time to get involved in politics and the military and was also a founding member of the Royal Society. I tried to cover as much ground as possible in the couple of hours we had there and I could easily have spent all day there but we had to press on.

Einstein, people, Einstein

During another soaking we found ourselves diving into the Museum of the History of Science; we hadn't planned to come here, I didn't know it even existed, but I'm very glad we stumbled in. It is housed in the old Ashmolean museum building and holds an array of curiosities and instruments of science over three floors; this is what was constructed at the behest of Elias Ashmole and it remains the oldest purpose built museum in the world. It's actually quite small but packs a lot of science in for all that. For me, the most exciting item wasn't one of Marconi's first radios or a 16th century astrolabe but some chalk dust. But this chalk dust wasn't just any old chalk dust, this was left by the hand of Albert Einstein no less, a personal hero of mine. This was a blackboard he wrote on during a series of three lectures that he gave in Oxford in 1931 long after he first published his theory of Special Relativity and still a full decade before he helped unlock the power of the atom as part of the Manhattan Project. By this time, through careful observation of red shifts in the light from distant galaxies, Edwin Hubble (he of the eponymous space telescope) had proven that the universe was expanding. The equations on the board are a potential simple model to explain this. The first three lines establish an equation for D, the rate of expansion of the universe; the four lines below attempt to put numerical quantities to the expansion, density, age and radius of the universe. When I was 17 I chose to go into biology, specifically genetics, but I almost chose astrophysics. I find it endlessly fascinating and probably do more reading on that topic than almost any other so, I'll be honest, I got quite excited by this blackboard.

Okay, I'll stop being a geek now and return to Oxford.

Actually, no, I wont. I have one last bit of geekery to dispense. Before arriving in Oxford there was really only one thing that I absolutely wanted to see and that was the Bodleian Library. The library has existed in one form or another since the 14th century but has been in it's present location since 1602, that's three years before the Gun Powder Plot. After years of neglect it was given the boost it so badly needed by Sir Thomas Bodley who used his wife's fortune to set it up during his retirement. More than 400 years later the Bodleian is one of 6 libraries in the UK that is entitled to a free copy of everything published here; that includes all books, pamphlets, newspapers and magazines. The collection now extends to over 11 million items stacked onto 117 miles of shelving. Unfortunately it is not permitted for any old riff raff to just walk into this amazing building, it is mainly just for the use of students and staff of Oxford University although access can sometimes be granted by prior appointment.

One of the entrances to the Bodleian Library. I had to wait a bloody long time for there to be no people there.

Right, geekery over. One area that did lend itself to ducking for cover from rain was the indoor market which was an absolute gem. It had everything you could hope for; little boutiques that made bespoke jewellery, decent clothes shops that offered something different from the highstreet, busy little cafes and multiple butchers and bakers. The only thing it was missing was a candlestick maker. I was singularly excited to find a little milliner that was choc full of a superb range of hats; I took it upon myself to acquire a rather fetching fedora.

On Sunday we had a few hours spare before catching the train back home to London and I had the idea of walking along the river, this was quite a fortuitous decision as not only was the weather glorious but it actually led us to the most interesting parts of Oxford.

We headed for the Cherwell and followed it downstream til it's confluence with the Thames at which point it probably quadrupled in size. This was all very pleasant, we were skirting around the west and south of the city, it was quiet and green and peaceful. With the hour of our departure fast approaching though, we abandoned the river and turned north to head back into town and it was at this point that we stumbled upon Christchurch College which was, frankly, magnificent. It appeared to be much larger and more grand than the others we had seen so far and it was a pity we couldn't get inside to have a look around.

The front of Christchurch College. My school did not look like this.

Walking around the grounds led us north through the south east of the city and back up to the Bodleian Library and the John Radcliffe Camera. Now, being a bit of a camera geek and then seeing the monstrous size of this camera I was clearly going to be very excited to investigate this. Unhappily, it turns out that camera is simply the latin word for room; the John Radclife Room is not quite such an exciting prospect. That said, it is quite a structure and is, today, a part of the Bodleian. But who is this John Radcliffe and why is half of Oxford named after him? Investigations reveal that he was mostly a physician, which I suppose explains why there is a hospital named after him. When he died, in 1714, he bequeathed much of his substantial wealth to the university and St. Bart's Hospital in London; a charitable trust founded in his will still exists to this day.

Sue and I had a great time in Oxford; it's an ancient and interesting city and for a while we lived the five star lifestyle. It seems to be a city that has it's worth not in the place itself or the events that took place there but in the people that have lived there and invested so much in it. Once we were safely ensconced on the train home we did both independently admit that we preferred Cambridge although it's difficult to say why. If I'm honest, the fact that I was born there may have swayed my decision.

The John Radcliffe Room, as it should more accurately be called.

Birthday Blog

One year. That's how long I have been writing this blog now. It is customary upon reaching such milestones to undertake a little naval gazing and so I beg your indulgence. This is my 42nd post in 52 weeks which, frankly, is a pace I sometimes struggle to keep up. My first post, was read by three people and one of those was probably me; I can now expect to get a few hundred readers per month, so thank you to all of you that do. To mark this auspicious occasion I have amassed 10 of the best photos posted from the last year. I have selected them based on a mixture of my own personal preference, comments I have received from you guys and which posts have got the most views. So, in no particular order.....

This is a view of the Nile from a hill top cafe in Aswan

Close up of hieroglyphs with very shallow depth of field

You need straight trunks and high branches to get this classic shot

Possibly my favourite picture I've ever taken

This is a close up of a goat's horn with it's out of focus fur as the background. I love the detail

This shows what can be achieved with a long exposure and a, mostly, steady hand

It took a lot of work, good timing and a good deal of luck to get this shot

I love the atmosphere in this shot of my wife in a Vietnam market

I like the depth of field in this one, it nicely sums up the look of a Vietnamese temple complex

This is Eleanor and Sue in the War museum in Ho Chin Minh City, the girls stance and the sobering content make for a compelling image