Canary Wharf - A week in London - 6
St. Paul's Cathedral and other destinations in the city center
Kew Garden
Southwark
One last morning and back home
Thu, Sept. 4, 2025 - Canary Wharf
Jürgen is becoming unwell. Yesterday, he mentioned feeling the beginnings of a cold, and today it is starting to get worse. At the moment, it is raining quite heavily again, but according to the weather radar, it should improve during the morning. After breakfast, we decide to stay in bed for a while longer. When we get up, it does indeed look better outside.
The plan for this morning is to take the Overground to Canary Wharf [↗]. Their station is also very close by. By the way, the train is quite expensive compared to the subway.
Canary Wharf is an old port area that being developed into a new city center. It's similar to Hafencity in Hamburg, except that less attention is being paid to preserving old buildings and more to constructing new high rise buildings. The first attempt wasn't really successful, but with a new general contractor, the project took off. The usual banks, law firms, and consulting companies have settled here. These are complemented by shopping centers, restaurants, and, probably quite expensive, apartment blocks. There are even a few hardy souls swimming in the canals.
As part of the development, requirements were also set regarding connections to public transportation. As a result, the train stations offer a few interesting sights.
There is also a small museum [↗] dedicated to the history of the Docklands. Initially, we only wanted to take a quick look inside. Jürgen had booked tickets for the British Museum for the afternoon. However, after 10 minutes, we change our plans. The British Museum is canceled, and we stay here.
The Docklands were London's largest and most important port area, at least until the introduction of shipping containers. The museum covers everything from the goods that were traded and processed here, to the slave trade that to a large extent made this trade possible, to the changes resulting from the introduction of containers and the transformation into a modern city center. One particularly nice area recreates some old alleyways. It's amazing what you can fit into such an old warehouse.
We walk around the area a little longer and then decide to have a late lunch here. We both order fish, and once again, it's delicious. So far, we can't complain about English cuisine. Well, except that apart from fish and chips, there was nothing typically English on our menu.
Now we head back to the British Museum area. Nearby is Heal's Department Store [↗], a furniture store, which is said to have a staircase worth seeing. We also take a look at a small part of the store, but even if we found something, how would we get it home?
Very close to the subway station is Outernet London [↗], where art installations are to be projected onto large LCD walls. Well, we expected more from that.
As we have heard, there is going to be a strike on the underground starting tomorrow evening. For a whole week! Great, our flight leaves on Sunday and we have to get to Heathrow somehow. In the details, it says that there will be restrictions on the normal lines, but the Elizabeth Line, which we have to take to the airport, will only be affected if a station is closed. The station nearest to our hotel on the Elizabeth Line is Liverpool Street. It's about a kilometer's walk.
We decide to check it out now and instead of going to our usual destination, Tower Hill, we go to Liverpool Street and walk from there to the hotel. Not a problem. It shouldn't be an issue with luggage either.
At the hotel, Freya is too lazy to go swimming and Jürgen is sniffling and coughing.
