Travel
Have an eyeful
by Joanne Black
Selfridges, Harrod’s, Fortnum & Mason and Harvey Nichols are the must-sees of London. But even the most modest plans can go awry.
The problem was my choice of guidebook. Just before I left home I had renounced my earnest research (Vogue, House & Garden) in favour of Peter Ackroyd’s London: The Bio-graphy, a social and cultural history of the city. I lugged Ackroyd to London and the more I read, the more I felt my plans to visit the upmarket department stores and gallery shops were not going to fulfil all my heart’s desires.
For two days, my group of four had the benefit of a Blue Badge guide, Ann Mark, who proved an inspired leader. Far from wanting to shake her off and go shopping, I did not want her to leave us, so erudite and quirky was her commentary and so great her depth of knowledge. Actually, she was not averse to a spot of shopping, either, it turned out.
London is made for walking: the central city is not carved up by motorways, so you can follow a map without discovering that what you thought was a shortcut turns out to be a six-lane freeway. We set off from our hotel near lower Regent Street and crossed over Pall Mall into The Mall. “That’s Buckingham Palace down there, in case any of you didn’t know,” said Ann, casually. I looked up, and indeed it was the palace, which I recognised from the biscuit tins of my youth. I suppose I saw Buckingham Palace on my OE more than 25 years ago, although my aversion then to seeing anything that everyone else was seeing meant I missed out on a lot.
We nipped through St James’s Park, past the House of Commons, and the wall of anti-Iraq posters and images, by which Brian Haw kept a lonely vigil. The former carpenter’s protest in Parliament Square had become so unruly that legislation thinly disguised at targeting him personally had been recently passed. Haw ignored the restrictions and two days after we saw him we turned on breakfast TV to learn that, at 2.00am, 20 police had swooped in and dismantled his wall of placards.
We crossed the river to the London Eye, an enormous Ferris wheel on the south bank of the Thames. In the absence of ghastly Sky Tower-type architecture, or a respectable hill, it’s a good way to get an aerial view of the city, though, at less expense and a lot more effort, a similar view is afforded by walking 530 steps up to the top of St Paul’s dome.
From the Eye we walked along the Embankment to the Tate Modern, one of the world’s most celebrated contemporary art institutions, which is housed in an old power station. Naturally, when faced with the choice between seeing world-famous art or going shopping, I did not hesitate. The shops were great.
From the Tate it was a quick step to Shakespeare’s Globe, a reconstruction built very close to the site of the original. The joy here was another inspiring guide, Glenis Carlton, whose passion was infectious. And the shop was damned good, too.
Across the river again, and with me now carrying two large shopping bags, we went to St Paul’s Cathedral, another of those famous landmarks that I was busy not seeing when on my OE. It jaw-droppingly majestic, especially having just undergone extensive renovations. You imagine Christopher Wren watching this masterpiece come together after the Great Fire of London had cleared the site for him. There is a shop here too but, oddly, I never feel that when in a church it is appropriate to shop for anything other than salvation, so I missed my chance on that one.
Although there are many elaborate statues and tombs at St Paul’s, Wren’s resting place is marked by a simple plaque. His epitaph, written by his son, ends; “If you seek a monument, look around you.” It would not be bad advice, either, to anyone seeking London’s history. The city’s history is in its street names, in the cobblestones and worn steps under the visitor’s feet, in the grand architecture and in glimpses down little lanes that might reveal one more treasure. Or at least a good shop.
Joanne Black travelled with assistance from Air New Zealand and Visit Britain.
