Culture day...

From Gabriels Warf to the National Portrait Gallery. From Globe Theatre to The Clink. Culture day was a great wee time. My highlight though was definitely St. Paul's Cathedral so I've decided to tell you a bit about that place... because I've been lazy and not written for a few days I've forgotten quite a lot of what happened... I am on my holidays... So...

There has been a Cathedral or at least some form of church on this site since around 604AD. The latest is the forth or fifth incarnation and was designed by Sir Christopher Wren a few centuries back and built after the Great Fire of London in 1666. It opened in the early 18th century. Sir Wren now lies beneath in the crypt with, among others, a guy called Nelson and a dude called Arthur Wellesely, Duke of Wellington. He had a big noise. They both like a good fight.

After I got over the fact that there is a memorial in there to a guy called "Roberts" we climbed up to the Whispering Gallery. The acoustics are so good up there that you can literally whisper from one side of the dome and be heard perfectly on the other, hence the name.

The dome also boasts' one of the most remarkable painted roofs of all time. Painted by Sir James Thornhill it is surely a rival to the Sistine Chapel. Legend has it that James nearly fell to his death while painting this masterpiece. Saved only by an apprentice who deliberately smudged some paint so that Thornhill would leap forward in protest. Had he not he would have fallen from the scaffold and surely perished on the floor.

We climbed more than a thousand steps in total to get to the Stone Gallery. We both suffered some dizzy spells on the way up the spiral stair case. It gave me the boke. It was well worth it though to see the panoramic views of London from the top.

Anyway thats it for now.
Good talk
M xx


DISASTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'VE JUST DISCOVERED THAT I DELETED ALL MY PICTURES FROM ST PAUL'S. BAD BAD NEWS. I PAID £8.50 FOR THAT AS WELL.