Wynmelvin » London Underground http://blog.wynmelvin.com [ the blog ] Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:15:48 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9 en hourly 1 October 31st, 2009 http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/october-31st-2009/ http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/october-31st-2009/#comments Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:26:23 +0000 Russell http://blog.wynmelvin.com/?p=799 LONDON — Today I returned to the British Library. Now that I knew the date of Benjamin Coles’ death, I reasoned that I would be better able to select documents more likely to yield a positive result. I requested five and it was in the last that I viewed that I found what I was looking for. So after four hours of searching I put in a request to have a couple of pages scanned, and I now have to return on Monday afternoon to collect my copy.

Getting around London is a bit fraught this weekend—the last weekend of mid-term break. Not because their are kids everywhere, or the fact that it’s Halloween, but because the London Transport Authority chose this weekend to close three lines completely with partial closures of five others for engineering maintenance. Unfortunately the Circle line is one of those closed completely as I find that is the one I use most often. My London Underground app has certainly paid for itself.

]]> http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/october-31st-2009/feed/ 0 September 6th, 2009 http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/09/september-6th-2009/ http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/09/september-6th-2009/#comments Sun, 06 Sep 2009 20:26:34 +0000 Russell http://blog.wynmelvin.com/?p=287 LONDON — The day started more leisurely than usual as breakfast is a half hour later on Sundays. I took the extra time to finally begin reading the novel I had bought for the flight and ended up going down to the dining room later than I had planned. Today I was going to go to the British Museum, and getting there was going to prove to be a bit of a mini-drama.

The plan: take the Circle line eastbound from Paddington to King’s Cross; change to the Picadilly line westbound to Russell Square. The reality: severe delays due to signal failure on the eastbound Circle line meant passengers were advised to take the District line one stop to Edgware Road and change to the Hammersmith & City line to King’s Cross. Unfortunately, once at King’s Cross I discovered that the Picadilly line was closed for improvements which meant I needed to change to the Victoria Line southbound to Oxford Circus and then change again to the Central line eastbound to Holborn. From there it was a six minute (or thereabouts) walk to the Museum. Arrived at about 10:30 am. and was immediately asked to take a photo for a trio of Japanese tourists.

The Museum was exactly as I had remembered. The highlights for me were again the wings devoted to ancient history with artifacts and monuments from Assyria, Egypt, Greece and Rome, and an automaton in the form of a ship that I had missed seeing on my last visit. The finedly detailed automaton was designed to sail down a banquet table and fire its miniature cannons to announce the start of the feasting. Another highlight is the museum building itself, especially the domed Great Court—an oasis of calm even, it seems, when it is teeming with hordes of visitors.

A new exhibition is starting in late September called Moctezuma: Aztec Ruler, so I just might make another return visit.

After leaving the museum I wandered around Holborn for an hour or so, up Bow Street and down Drury Lane, and ending up spending far more than I had planned. I can’t say much more than that as it would spoil the surprise!

Getting back to the hotel was drama-free as I now knew what lines needed avoiding. Tomorrow it’s good-bye London and hello Truro.

]]> http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/09/september-6th-2009/feed/ 4