London part 2

Today I have a little more time and therefore a few more pictures with me! :)

The first picture shows our street, our house is on the left side. If you were to walk this street for another 2 hours, you still wouldn't be able to tell the houses apart, it feels like every residential building in England looks the same.

In the 2nd picture, we were on the Millennium Bridge, which was built specifically for the millennium. The pedestrian bridge offers a beautiful view of the city and leads directly to the Tate Modern, an art gallery that I really wanted to visit! More about that in the next few days when we go back in, the first time I forgot to take photos because I was too busy looking and marveling...

Next up is the London Eye, illuminated it stands out astonishingly from the skyline. Unfortunately, it is quite expensive to ride, so we just go to skyscrapers instead, where you can go up for free and still get a beautiful view. :-)

Picture No. 4 shows St. Paul's Cathedral, which was London's tallest building for a long time. During normal operation, you have to pay about 27€ to enter, but in the next few days, there will be a choir event where you can go in for free, so I will be able to admire it from the inside as well!

Laura can certainly remember the place from the next picture, as the Festival of Lights took place there at the beginning of the year. Piccadilly Circus is a huge and beautiful square between the shopping street and the Queen's Palace.

Yesterday we had burgers at home, they were so delicious that I had to take a picture... :D
Our host mother is a strict Muslim, so they were made of chicken meat, the fries were topped with cheese (like almost everything our host mother cooks), and together with a devilishly hot chili sauce, it was incredibly delicious.

The next picture is unfortunately a bit blurry, but I didn't want to look the - not at all shy - free-roaming wolf in the eye from closer than 4 meters. So far, I have seen one or more wolves on every nightly walk in our area, they roam around here like free-roaming dogs in other countries and are part of the cityscape, just like all the cats in Riemerling. :)

The picture with the (way too many) people was taken this morning. The whole main line was closed due to a strike and suddenly a 30-minute trip to the city turned into almost 3 hours. Just to get to the nearby subway station, we had to wait in line for over an hour! Since I know the Tubes here, I will be able to ride the subway in Munich completely relaxed from now on.

We continue with the tour we took today, a Docklands tour. London's economic success is almost entirely due to all the ports that used to provide goods from all over the world. Nowadays, most of these ports are closed, restored, or converted into office complexes.
Today we spent 4 hours on the banks of the Thames, exploring many of these ports, and the picture was taken directly under the famous Tower Bridge.

You can also see it in the next picture, especially up close, the size of this bridge is simply impressive. I can't imagine how such a massive structure can be lifted up! Hopefully, I will also get to see that live sometime.

This small harbor has been restored and is still in use today for private boats. In the picture, you can see an old warehouse / old factory building that now serves as many small restaurants and apartments, but unfortunately, they are unaffordable...

The pub in the next picture looked incredibly inviting in real life, so we wanted to go there again in the next few days.

As you can see, we also had pretty good weather today. I will simply miss all the walks along the Thames, there is almost nothing better to do in London.

On our tour today, we came to a kind of 'new' London, a bit off the city center, another district is emerging, which is mainly covered with skyscrapers and office complexes and is almost the size of its own city. The color of the water, by the way, is original green, the picture has not been edited. It is even the same water that flows through the Thames (note the color difference!)

Here's a little snapshot with a plane sneaking in. By the way, they always fly so low over the city, no matter where you are.

The last stop for today was Greenwich. On the other side of the river, you can already see the two towers. This is the University of Greenwich and at the same time the place with the zero meridian.

Another picture showing the incredibly beautiful walkways along the Thames.

By the way, we somehow had to get over there to get to Greenwich. Unfortunately, there is no bridge in sight that we could use, so a pedestrian tunnel was created for the workers in the past, which reminds one of the CERN. By the way, there are also bicycles buzzing through there.

Upon arrival in Greenwich, you are first greeted by a huge sailing ship in the market square. It used to be the fastest ship in the world, today it is restored and converted into a museum. Unfortunately, I didn't go inside, but even from the outside, it looked very impressive!

Finally, a picture with a view directly from the Prime Meridian, on the right you can see the 'new' city that I just mentioned, and in the background on the left, you can see London's city center as you know it.

That's it for today, I'm going out now to watch all the fireworks that have been happening all over the city for days! Tomorrow we'll be back at college.

Greetings to Ottobrunn, Putzbrunn, Oberschleißheim, and of course to Augsburg! <3

Your Jan