{"id":1350,"date":"2013-07-09T05:44:35","date_gmt":"2013-07-09T09:44:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/?page_id=1350"},"modified":"2014-10-25T11:51:28","modified_gmt":"2014-10-25T15:51:28","slug":"my-visit-with-archie-2013-page-9","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/my-visit-with-archie-2013-page-9\/","title":{"rendered":"My Visit with Archie – Page 09"},"content":{"rendered":"

My Visit with Archie – Page 9<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Rollin’ on the River”<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s now Day 8. \u00a0We decided to go to Grenwich to see the Zero Meridian. The best way to do this is by a river boat cruise on the Thames River,\"3500<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0Here’s another panhandler getting a ticket. \u00a0Everyone was quite civil.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>We took the “tube” to Westminster and came out of the station and saw the “Eye”<\/span>.<\/strong><\/strong>\"3515<\/a>The London Eye is a giant\u00a0<\/span><\/a>Ferris wheel<\/span><\/a>\u00a0on the\u00a0South Bank<\/span><\/a>\u00a0of theRiver Thames<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0The entire structure is 443 ft tall and the wheel has a diameter of 394 ft.\u00a0It is the tallest\u00a0Ferris wheel in Europe<\/span><\/a>, and the most popular paid\u00a0tourist attraction in the United Kingdom<\/span><\/a>, visited by over 3.5 million people annually. When erected in 1999 it was the tallest Ferris wheel in the world.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Note the river cruise boat below the Eye. That’s what we cruised on to Grenwich.<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"3517<\/a>The London Eye can carry 800 passengers per revolution – equivalent to 11 London red doubled-decker buses. Each of the 32 capsules weighs 11 tons. Each rotation takes about 30 minutes. Each capsules represents one of the\u00a0London Boroughs<\/span><\/a>, and holds up to 25 people, who are free to walk around inside the capsule, though seating is provided. It does not usually stop to take on passengers; the rotation rate is slow enough to allow passengers to walk on and off the moving capsules at ground level. Tickets cost about $45.00 each and advanced reservations are required. Archie and I didn’t ride it.<\/strong><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"3510<\/a>We left on our cruise at Westminster below Big Ben.<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"3530<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0A<\/strong>nchors awiegh…<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3550<\/a>We passed “The Shard” (This is a post card view.).The Shard, also referred to as the Shard of Glass is a 72-story skyscraper in London. Its construction began in March 2009; it was topped out on 30 March 2012 and inaugurated on 5 July 2012.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Shard contains premium office space, a hotel, luxury residences,\u00a0retail space, restaurants, a five-story public viewing gallery,\u00a0and a spa.\u00a0The public viewing gallery is located between the 68th and 72nd floors, with its highest section at a height of 804\u00a0ft, and is expected to draw over two million visitors a year. The adult entry fee is about $37.00.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3560<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

London Millennium Footbridge, is a\u00a0steel<\/span><\/a>\u00a0suspension bridge<\/span><\/a>\u00a0for pedestrians crossing the\u00a0River Thames<\/span><\/a>.near Saint Paul’s Cathedral. \u00a0It was opened in 2000.\u00a0Londoners nicknamed the bridge the “Wobbly Bridge” after participants in a charity walk\u00a0felt an unexpected and, for some, uncomfortable swaying motion on the first two days after the bridge opened. The bridge was closed for almost two years while modifications were made to eliminate the wobble. It reopened in 2002.\u00a0We cruised under the bridge, but I thought this picture was interesting because ti showed St Paul’s..<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"3570<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0At the near end of the bridge is the Shakespeare’s Globe\u00a0is a reconstruction of the\u00a0Globe Theater<\/span><\/a>, an Elizabethan playhouse on the south bank of the\u00a0Thames<\/span><\/a>\u00a0that was originally built in 1599, destroyed by fire in 1613, rebuilt in 1614, and then demolished in 1644. The modern reconstruction is an academic approximation based on available evidence of the 1599 and 1614 buildings. It was founded by the actor and director\u00a0Sam Wanamaker<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and built about 750\u00a0ft from the site of the original theater and opened to the public in 1997, with a production of\u00a0Henry V<\/span><\/a><\/i>.<\/strong><\/span>\"3570<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We also passed The Golden Hind\u00a0\u00a0or\u00a0Hinde<\/i>\u00a0which was an\u00a0English<\/span><\/a>\u00a0galleon<\/span><\/a>\u00a0best known for its\u00a0circumnavigation<\/span><\/a>\u00a0of the globe between 1577 and 1580 \u00a0and captained by Sir\u00a0Francis Drake<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0On 1 March 1579, off the coast of Ecuador, the\u00a0Golden Hind<\/i>\u00a0challenged and captured the Spanish galleon\u00a0Nuestra Se\u00f1ora de la Concepci\u00f3n<\/i><\/span><\/a>. This galleon had the largest treasure captured to that date: over 360,000 Pesos ($?).<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

On 26 September 1580, Francis Drake sailed his ship into Plymouth Harbor with only 56 of the original crew of 80 left aboard.\u00a0\u00a0Queen Elizabeth I\u00a0personally bestowed a\u00a0knighthood<\/span><\/a>\u00a0on him.\u00a0\u00a0Her share of the treasure came to almost \u00a3160,000: Enough to pay off her entire foreign debt and still have \u00a340,000 left over to invest in a new trading company.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"3600<\/a>We cruised under the Tower Bridge. The bridge (built between 1886 and 1894 )consists of two towers tied together at the upper level by means of two horizontal walkways, designed to withstand the horizontal forces exerted by the suspended sections of the bridge on the landward sides of the towers.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The bridge is 800 feet \u00a0in length with two towers each 213 feet high, built on piers. The central span of 200 feet \u00a0between the towers is split into two equal bascules \u00a0(remember the Pegasus bridge in Normandy? \u00a0Same type of bridge.) which can be raised to an angle of 86 degrees to allow river traffic to pass. The bascules, weighing over 1,000 tons each, are counterbalanced to minimise the force<\/strong>required\u00a0<\/strong>and allow raising in five minutes.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The original lifting power was done with steam drive hydralic pistons. Now it’s electricly powered.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3605<\/a>Here is some detail of one of the Towers. \u00a0Note the Gherkin building in the background. More on this later.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3610<\/a><\/p>\n

This is Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the\u00a0Tower of London, is a historic\u00a0castle\u00a0on the north bank of the<\/span><\/a>\u00a0river.\u00a0\u00a0It was founded towards the end of 1066 as part of the\u00a0Norman Conquest of England<\/span><\/a>. The\u00a0White Tower<\/span><\/a>, which gives the entire castle its name, was built by\u00a0William the Conqueror<\/span><\/a>\u00a0(remember the Bayeux Tapestry?)\u00a0in 1078, and was a resented symbol of oppression, inflicted upon London by the new ruling elite.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0The Tower has served variously as an\u00a0armory<\/span><\/a>, a\u00a0treasury<\/span><\/a>, a\u00a0menagerie<\/span><\/a>, the home of the\u00a0Royal Mint<\/span><\/a>, a public records office, and the home of the\u00a0Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0Despite its enduring reputation as a place of torture and death, popularized by 16th-century religious propagandists and 19th-century writers, only seven people were executed within the Tower before WWI..<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The entrance in the lower right is the “Traitor’s Gate” where prisoners were brought in by boat from the river<\/span>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3620<\/a>This is the MV Havengore.\u00a0It<\/i>\u00a0is a former\u00a0hydrographic<\/span><\/a>\u00a0survey launch<\/span><\/a>\u00a0re-registered as a\u00a0passenger vessel<\/span><\/a>\u00a0for up to 40 passengers.\u00a0She is best known for her association with Winston Churchill.<\/span><\/a>\u00a0It carried\u00a0Sir Winston’s<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/a>body\u00a0on his last journey by water along the River Thames from\u00a0Tower Pier<\/span><\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0Festival Pier<\/span><\/a>\u00a0during his\u00a0State Funeral<\/span><\/a>. This event was broadcast live to an estimated worldwide audience of 350 million viewers, one in ten of the then\u00a0world population<\/span><\/a>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"3630<\/a>The area, known as th<\/strong>e\u00a0<\/span>Canary Wharf, contains around 14,000,000 square feet of office and retail space, of which around 7,900,000 square feet \u00a0is owned by\u00a0Canary Wharf Group<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0Around 90,000 people work there\u00a0and it is home to the world or European headquarters of numerous major banks, professional services firms and media organisations including\u00a0Barclays<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0Citigroup<\/span><\/a>,,\u00a0Credit Suisse<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0\u00a0HSBC<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0J.P. Morgan<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0KPMG<\/span><\/a>\u00a0,MetLife<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0Morgan Stanley<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0State Street<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Thomson Reuters<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This is Great Britian’s\u00a0Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich. \u00a0It is the counterpart to the US Naval Academy in Baltimore, MD, USA.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3640<\/a> \"3645<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0I have to add these pictures below \u00a0because one of my nieces is a Cadet at the US Naval Academy.<\/span><\/strong>\"3820<\/a> \"3830<\/a>Yes, Laura, they did have women in the Navy way back then! With snappy uniforms, too.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The\u00a0Cutty Sark<\/i>\u00a0is a British clipper\u00a0ship. Built in 1869 , she was one of the last tea clippers to be built and one of the fastest, coming at the end of a long period of design development which halted as sailing ships gave way to steam propulsion.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The opening of the\u00a0Suez Canal<\/span><\/a>\u00a0(also in 1869) meant that steam ships now had a much shorter route to China, so\u00a0Cutty Sark<\/i>\u00a0spent only a few years on the tea trade before turning to the trade in wool from Australia, where she held the record time to Britain for ten years. Improvements in steam technology meant that gradually steamships also came to dominate the longer sailing route to Australia and the ship was sold to a Portuguese company in 1895 and renamed\u00a0Ferreira<\/i>. She continued as a cargo ship until sold again in 1922, and was used as a training ship until\u00a01954 when she was transferred to permanent dry dock at Grenwich.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3650<\/a>The blue glass represents the ocean and allows the hull’s bottom to be lighted.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here are a couple of pictures of tea boxes and wool bales, the Cutty Sark’s cargos.<\/strong>\"3710<\/a> \"3730<\/a><\/p>\n

Below decks:<\/strong>\"3790<\/a><\/p>\n

The ship is actually in a dry dock suspended and supported by huge braces connecting her hull to the dry dock walls. \u00a0There is a snack bar beneath her. \u00a0Notice that the hull is sheathed in\u00a0Muntz metal<\/span><\/a>\u00a0which is a form of\u00a0brass<\/span><\/a>\u00a0with about 60%\u00a0copper<\/span><\/a>, 40%\u00a0zinc<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and a trace of iron.\u00a0Its original application was as a replacement for\u00a0copper sheathing<\/span><\/a>\u00a0on the bottom of ships, as it maintained the\u00a0anti-fouling<\/span><\/a>\u00a0abilities of the pure copper at around two thirds of the price.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"3800<\/a>At the far end of the dry dock there appeared to be a group of peopleclisening to a talk. On closer examination, it was actually a collection of ship’s figureheads.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"3810<\/a>\u00a0One figurehead was above all the others. \u00a0It was the figurehead from he Cutty Sark. \u00a0It depicted a woman all in white holding a horses tail. \u00a0What’s the story here?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here’s the story:. \u00a0Robert Burns, a Scottish poet wrote the poem “Tam O’Shanter’ in 1790,<\/strong><\/p>\n

First published in 1791, it is one of Burns’s longer poems, and employs a mixture of\u00a0Scots<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0English<\/span><\/a>. It tells the story of Tam, a farmer who gets drunk with his friends in apublic house<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and then rides home on his horse Meg. On the way he sees the local haunted church lit up with witches and warlocks dancing and the devil playing the\u00a0bagpipes<\/span><\/a>. He creeps into the churchyard to watch and on seeing a pretty witch in a short dress he shouts,`Weel done, cutty-sark!’ (cutty-sark<\/i>\u00a0: “short shirt”). Having drawn attention to himself the dancing stops abruptly and the witches chase him and Meg to the\u00a0River Doon<\/span><\/a>. The witch cannot cross the water but she come so close to catching Tam and Meg that she pull Meg’s tail off just as she reaches the bridge over the Doon. \u00a0Now you know.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Read the poem. \u00a0It’s on the internet with a modern translation. \u00a0It’s really neat!<\/strong><\/p>\n

Page 10 follows our return up the river and back to Archies for my last night.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Go to Page 10<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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My Visit with Archie – Page 9 “Rollin’ on the River” It’s now Day 8. \u00a0We decided to go to Grenwich to see the Zero Meridian. The best way to do this is by a river boat cruise on the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1350","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1350"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2435,"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1350\/revisions\/2435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prstevens.stonehippo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}