Happy Birthday Lucas!
Lucas turned one this week. The family travelled to London last weekend to help him celebrate. Nat went to see Janice's local production of 'The Boyfriend', which was a show Nat was a part of back her high school days. Nat enjoyed a night out on the town, whilst I stayed back at Janice's and babysat.
The next day we had planned to meet up with friends at the Royal Observatory at Greenwich. The London Marathon was on that morning, but we presumed that it wouldn't cause too much trouble for us as it started at 9:00 am, and we weren't planning on arriving at Greenwhich until after 12:00 pm.
We left Edgeware just after 10 am. We had checked ahead and although a section of the Northern Line was closed for upgrades, we still had plenty of time up our sleeve. That changed once we arrived at Bank to get on the DLR (Docklands Light Rail). This is a brand new overland rail that winds its way through Canary Warf and the new areas of London.
Unfortunately an incident on the line meant that it was stopping about 4 stations short of Greenwich. Instead, we were deposited at Crossharbour station at about 11:30 am, smack bang in the middle of the London Marathon.
We continued to head south along the closed DLR line, heading towards the Greenwich foot tunnel to get us under the Thames. At one point we all had to cross the race.. quite a feat considering we had Lucas with us! We just waited for a break in the race and went for it. And before you ask, we did ask a bobby's permission first. Upon arrival at the Greenwich tunnel, we found that it was closed to all south-bound 'traffic', in order to clear the spectator congestion near the starting sections of the race. So we took the opportunity to take a break and feed Lucas.
Greenwich itself is a lovely part of London, with very much a 'village' feel.
The park surrounding the observatory was packed with people enjoying the warm spring weather, apparently it has been the warmest April ever on record.. which is about 350 years in England. Don't worry Dad, I'm sure its just a co-incidence and climate change/global warming is just a big conspiracy ;)
For those of you who don't know, Greenwich was founded by King Charles the II, who appointed John Flamsteed to make observations of the heavens to perfect the art of sea-faring navigation (ie solve the longitude problem). The construction of accurate clocks (or chronometers), in conjunction with the accurate observations that he recorded, enabled to British Navy and Merchant Fleet to dominate the world.
Flamsteed's work was also used by Isaac Newton verify his theories on gravitation. In fact, Newton managed to obtain an early draft of Flamsteed's work and published it without his permission. Over time, Flamsteed managed to buy back almost every one of the draft copies and burnt them all in front of the Royal Obsevatory! Academics eh?
Flamsteed published his full works about a few years later.
A fantastic historical novel detailing the origins of the Royal Society and the birth of modern science (with much focus on Flamsteed) is Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle consisting of the books; Quicksilver, The Confusion and The System of The World.
The Confusion in particular is one of the most amazing books I have ever read and I strongly recommend the entire series.
The next day we had planned to meet up with friends at the Royal Observatory at Greenwich. The London Marathon was on that morning, but we presumed that it wouldn't cause too much trouble for us as it started at 9:00 am, and we weren't planning on arriving at Greenwhich until after 12:00 pm.
We left Edgeware just after 10 am. We had checked ahead and although a section of the Northern Line was closed for upgrades, we still had plenty of time up our sleeve. That changed once we arrived at Bank to get on the DLR (Docklands Light Rail). This is a brand new overland rail that winds its way through Canary Warf and the new areas of London.
Unfortunately an incident on the line meant that it was stopping about 4 stations short of Greenwich. Instead, we were deposited at Crossharbour station at about 11:30 am, smack bang in the middle of the London Marathon.
We continued to head south along the closed DLR line, heading towards the Greenwich foot tunnel to get us under the Thames. At one point we all had to cross the race.. quite a feat considering we had Lucas with us! We just waited for a break in the race and went for it. And before you ask, we did ask a bobby's permission first. Upon arrival at the Greenwich tunnel, we found that it was closed to all south-bound 'traffic', in order to clear the spectator congestion near the starting sections of the race. So we took the opportunity to take a break and feed Lucas.
Greenwich itself is a lovely part of London, with very much a 'village' feel.
The park surrounding the observatory was packed with people enjoying the warm spring weather, apparently it has been the warmest April ever on record.. which is about 350 years in England. Don't worry Dad, I'm sure its just a co-incidence and climate change/global warming is just a big conspiracy ;)
For those of you who don't know, Greenwich was founded by King Charles the II, who appointed John Flamsteed to make observations of the heavens to perfect the art of sea-faring navigation (ie solve the longitude problem). The construction of accurate clocks (or chronometers), in conjunction with the accurate observations that he recorded, enabled to British Navy and Merchant Fleet to dominate the world.
Flamsteed's work was also used by Isaac Newton verify his theories on gravitation. In fact, Newton managed to obtain an early draft of Flamsteed's work and published it without his permission. Over time, Flamsteed managed to buy back almost every one of the draft copies and burnt them all in front of the Royal Obsevatory! Academics eh?
Flamsteed published his full works about a few years later.
A fantastic historical novel detailing the origins of the Royal Society and the birth of modern science (with much focus on Flamsteed) is Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle consisting of the books; Quicksilver, The Confusion and The System of The World.
The Confusion in particular is one of the most amazing books I have ever read and I strongly recommend the entire series.
posted by PG at 12:15 PM
1 Comments:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY LUCAS!
Say hi to your mum and dad for me ;)
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