London Day 2

Chris needed to make an insurance claim against the theft of her iPhone. There is a Carphone Warehouse on the Strand at the Charing Cross station end. So we embarked from Abbey Wood only to see our train fail at Lewisham. The brakes locked-on and even on re-boot the train was still immobilised. We know this because we were at the front next to the driver's cab and could hear him talking to The Fat Controller. The station staff went into action and shepherded us onto the next Cannon St. train, not exactly where we wanted to go. Chris declined my kind offer of a bus up to the Strand. Hence our views of the wonderful London landmarks recorded here.
This has to be the Daily Express building on Fleet St. as it looks just like the one in Manchester, also used for other purposes than Princess Diana conspiracy journalism. The view is from a lovely pawn brokers opposite.
Fairly crude art deco.
Fairly crude arts and crafts.
But then this pure temple of capitalist delight. An arts and crafts, or is it sub-Pugin, inspired Lloyds bank. Anyway it's got lovely tile work, columns and doors - and they're automatic because today's fat bankers can't open doors.
Out of the City and into the Strand, I think. We found Carphone Warehouse by asking at the O2 shop which is a bit of a cheek actually. The nice young adult person filed our claim after Chris helped her spell 'Marigold', 'Borough' and 'foreign' - and explained that Halifax is a town in Yorkshire after which the bank is named and not the other way round. Ah educating youth, what a burden, though her ability to remember 20 digit numbers was very impressive.

All that means Chris will have a new iPhone waiting for her at the Halifax branch of Carphone Warehouse.
After that we set off for the Chelsea Physic Garden. It's obligatory to see at least one Chelsea pensioner and photograph him.
Mindful of the NHS bill currently before parliament, we noted the green shoots of privatisation at the Royal Chelsea Hospital. We understand a Meryl Streep annex will soon be opened to extend the wonderful work of this Thatcher unit. I'm really pleased the IMDb rating for The Iron Lady is so low!
Anyway, the bloody Physic Garden was shut after all that walk, because either I'd mis-read the website or it didn't explain how unopen it is before 1 April. What's more one needs to transfer onto the 170 at Victoria to avoid a very long and rather dull walk.
It's Nick Green himself who advised me to visit the Physic Garden, second oldest in Britain. One-day we shall go round the grounds.
We caught the 170 back and transferred to the 211 which would take you over London Bridge if one stayed on it. We thought we would make a flying observance visit to Westminster Abbey until we saw the price of entry. As a confirmed member of this outfit I was disgusted at the £16 entry fee with no reduction for the lame or halt. Chris just thought that as they'd stolen it off of her lot in the first place, the charge was hardly surprising.


A note for younger readers - that was the London County Council and then the Greater London Council headquarters abolished by aforementioned Thatcher in 1986. Now London is run by a comedy buffoon called Boris out of a 'heritage' bus in Belgravia. We understand that London is the only capital city in the world that does not have a unified local government administration.
We waved at St Thomas's hospital in which is Chris's uncle Wallie. Then we went to see him.