Three Mills walk

It's all been a bit quiet round here, for the obvious reason that it has been too bloody cold for me to get out and about in London. In the first three months of the year I can count the times I went walking on one hand!

However the weather has finally taken a turn for the better and last weekend it was so lovely I decided I was going to go out properly somewhere new. 

I picked the Three Mills walk from my 50 London Walks book and headed off to Bromley-by-Bow, and then followed the route along the River Lea and the Hertford Union Canal, before getting bored and going off the route to make my way back round to Bromley-by-Bow. 

It was a really enjoyable walk - route here - although it was slightly odd to be walking a route designed in 2001, before we'd even got the Olympics, let alone seen everything built for them. And of course the pace of development is just getting quicker and quicker so there's an awful lot of buildings springing up in the area. 

The Clock Mill on Three Mills Island:

Photos from the rest of the walk along the river and canal:

And finally a couple of views from a park along the way. Which park? Who knows! I have failed to make a note so am not sure. I climbed up a mound to get these photos, anyway. /unhelpful

Open House London 2014 Day 2 Part 3

My next destination was THE MIDDLE OF FRICKING NOWHERE, or as close as you can get to the middle of nowhere in London (and you can, trust me on this one, I'm good at finding places like this). 

I went out to Trinity Buoy Wharf/Container City, first going to East India DLR and then following the signs (the signage was SUPER helpful, bless them) to Orchard Place. 

The first thing that greets you is this: 

which is nice. 

Just round the corner is this:

And then further down the road is a weird mishmash of artists' studios (Container City), a diner, a boat painted red, the only lighthouse in London and some art installations. And of course there are amazing views over the river. 

It is a really interesting site to wander around, especially if you like the aesthetics of containers (I do!). The installations are pretty interesting and tend to relate to the river:

Alunatime is London's first moon and tide clock and is a graphical notation of time in light (from photos it looks like this is better at night)

Floodtide is tidal sonification, which is to say it makes sounds depending on what the tides are doing.  

Inside the lighthouse was the most exciting thing - Longplayer. Longplayer is an installation I'd heard about somewhere and read about in one of my London books (I think it was Secret London). Longplayer is a song made with Tibetan singing bowls which is designed to play without repetition for 1000 years.

You can listen live! http://longplayer.org/listen/live-stream/

To finish, two views from the site. And the boat. 

In this one you can see the sculpture Quantum Cloud by Anthony Gormley. The darker shape in the middle looks like a human figure if you see it from the right angle (more info - http://www.antonygormley.com/sculpture/item-view/id/269).

Next post: last visit of the weekend! 

Not London! Düsseldorf

More photos from Düsseldorf...

Statues etc:

 

 

 

And water in Düsseldorf (the Rhein, Königsallee and random canals/channels that seem to pop up as you're wandering around)