#595 - Spot London Weather Vanes (2/6)

Timeout said:
A winged dragon built by Robert Bird in 1674 sits on a Wren steeple. This fine nine foot long monster can be found high above cheapside.

Dave did:

Its a rare occassion these days that I find myself in central London during the working week, but as it happened I was in such an occassion this week and had the chance to spot another nearby weather vane (ooh lucky me!).


Now having spotted the altogther rather odd grasshopper weather vane near the start of my 1000 Things adventure, spotting a dragon I felt would be a lot simpler, and lets face it dragon hunting is definitely a lot more exciting!

If you don't believe me, check out Mr. Batty's guide to dragon hunting in London (http://www.jimbatty.com/articles/dragonphotos.html) where he expicitly states that such a hunt requires 'patience, a sharp eye, and your wits about you. Unlike many other tourist subjects, images of dragons rarely offer themselves up...'

So don't just take my word for it! Dragon hunting is a whole new ball game, and I was about to find my first just outside my work offices at St. Pauls!




44 down...956 Things to go!

STOP THE PRESS!! - Daily Telegraph spots Gorilla!

Yup, I made it onto another newspapers website!

If anyone has a copy of the Sunday Telegraph from this past week, could you please have a peak in it for yours truly and if found scan a copy of the article through to me! Thanks!

#306 - Watch Tower Bridge Opening

Timeout said:
When unveiled in 1894, Tower Bridge represented a dazzlingly pioneering feat of engineering. To watch Tower Bridge in action is to see why London was once the most technologically advanced city in the world.

Dave did:
Its a funny old world we live in (I've always wanted to use that phrase!), checking out today's timetable for the opening of Tower Bridge, I found that a ferry ship called "The Waverley" was passing through the bridge twice in the space of half an hour.

Ok maybe thats not the most hilarious thing you've read today, or indeed in the world, but what was quite weird was that the Waverley is usually ferrying tourists around the West Coast of Scotland where I used to go with my family on Easter holidays (and still do every summer with my friends). The fact that it had somehow found its way down to London was beyond me (its not exactly a big or indeed fast moving boat...and I certainly wouldn't want to be a passenger on that voyage around the British Isle!)







44 down...956 Things to go!

#566 - Cross London's best Bridges (2/10)

Hungerford Bridge

Dave did:
A strange one this as its not actually labelled as Hungerford Bridge (its the Jubilee Bridge)...and there's two of them!?!

Ah well, the view was quite nice...





43 down...957 Things to go!

#414 - Ride the London Eye

Timeout said:
Most people hold out for blue skies to take a spin on the London Eye, and the skyline looks spectacular!

Dave did:
A new day, and an old pair of legs! The effects of a 7km run in a gorilla costume obviously doesn't go away over night...words cannot describe how my stiff my legs felt today!

And so it was that after a few hours of recuperation we planned the days events, and headed out hoping to ride the London Duck Truck (Thing #125).

Getting to the Duck Tour HQ at 4.30pm, however, we found they were fully booked up for the day and so it was out of the question. The HQ is located right behind the London Eye and so my parents and I wandered aimlessly up towards the Southbank and the Eye.

To our surprise, the Eye was very quiet, with barely 30 people queuing up to take a ride, or should I say 'flight' on London's most iconic Ferris Wheel. Given this unusual occasion we decided to pick up some last minute tickets and take our flight in one of the pods, afterall it was replacing the disappointment of Thing #125, with the dizzying heights of Thing #414.

I have to admit that the photographer and architectural side of me was really drawn to the London Eye. As a structure it is quite a beautiful thing. The starch white pylons against the clear blue skies really fascinate me, as do the other worldly shapes of the pods against the London skyline. Such was my interest in the construction of the Eye, I found myself taking far too many shots of it whilst queuing for ride itself!







Once up in the air I have to admit I felt a bit underwhelmed by the whole experience. Yes it was nice, and a bit different. But really the views weren't THAT spectacular that you'd want to write home about them (although why I'd choose to do that when my parents were standing right beside me is another altogether puzzling question!). At one point I did start wondering whether the London Eye or Primrose Hill provided the best skyline of London...and I was almost tempted to concede that the Hill won hands down!

That all said, I did get to see Westminister from a very nice elevated angle, I finally understood where 10 Downing Street was in relation to everything else in London, and after a lengthy discussion with my Dad I came to the sad conclusion that if I were to get the passengers of my pod to run from side to side, we could not eventually get the pod to roll 360 degress on its horizontal plane (damn those over-engineered gears!)







On our descent the tannoy system informed us that a photo was about to be taken of our capsule, and so if we wished to be in the shot we should all gather to the North-West corner. I'm pleased to say I appeared to be the only passenger with any sense of direction as all the tourists on board flocked to the South West corner, leaving me to pose on the capsules behalf....



43 down...957 Things to go!

#938 - Attend the London Design Festival

Timeout said:
The London Design Festival showcases the extraordinarily creative nature of the capital's desgn scene.

Dave did:
Having conquered the British Museum, and inspected all the dead bodies therein, I made one final effort to drag my parents over to Covent Garden where I had read that the London Design Festival was hosting an free exhibition in the Piazza.

Well after walking in and around the Piazza several times, sitting down and having something to eat whilst asking the waitress if she had heard of it (she hadn't), and about to give up on the whole thing altogether...I caught a glimpse of a red poster in the distance that closely resembled the London Design Festival logo.



On closer inspection I found that it was in fact the exhibition hall...under construction, and due to open tomorrow!!!

I couldn't believe that we had walked all this way and without being able to tick off one more Thing in London! As fate would have it, however, as I turned to leave defeated I found a glass bench in the middle of the street.



Ok, so it wasn't just any old bench, but it was a London Design Festival sponsored piece of art...with a special sign reading "Keep off the Glass", cleverly placed on the astro-turf grass.

So in my eyes I've attended a part of the London Design Festival, and it gave me a small chuckle (glass-grass...classic!)


42 down...958 Things to go!

#584 - Get eye-to-eye with London corpses 2/4 ("Lindow Man")

Timeout said:
Stay in the British Museum to meet this dried-out individual. His 2,000 year old body was discovered near Manchester in 1984.

Dave did:
Again, another dead, shrivelled up body...although probably in a bit of a worse state than poor old Ginger (the guy didn't even have any hair left, and he died at the age of 20!)





41 down...959 Things to go!

#584 - Get eye-to-eye with London corpses 1/4 ("Ginger")

Timeout said:
You'll find this red-hair cadaver in the British Museum. A naturally preserved Predynastic mummy, 'Ginger' is surrounded by burial goods to accompany him to the afterlife

Dave did:
What can I say about this one? A shrivelled up body of a long dead man, who has a small tuft of ginger hair above his ears...erm ok!





41 down...959 Things to go!

#553 - Do the British Museum in our lunchbreak

Timeout said:
Jog up the steps into Norman Foster's impressive glass-roofed Great Court. Swerve into Ancient Civilisations, then bound over to the Egyptian galleries, and forge ahead to Gallery 62 for a gander at the lavishly decorated coffins...

Dave did:

Bit of a cheat this one, but I hadn't had a proper lunch today, and I did sit down and have a coffee and pastry...so I did kinda go and see the Museum in my lunch hour! But to be honest you need a whole day to see the entire Museum, and I intend to return soon!



40 down...960 Things to go!

#284 - Sit in the Great Court at the British Museum

Timeout said:
The largest enclosed courtyard in Europe, the British Museum's Great Court has all the benfits of a classical public square - grandeur, proportion, shops, restaurants, people, events, light, air - without any of the attendant meteorological risks.

Dave did:
The first thing you notice about the British Museum as you enter is the absolutely huge skydome above it! It is quite simply amazing to look up at, but as I found out time and time again, it is also one of the most frustrating things to try and capture on camera! The scale, and pattern of the undulating glass roof (made up of 3,300 separate triangles by the way) just cannot be included in a straight forward photo shot!





39 down...961 Things to go!

#649 - Eye up haute fashion over lunch at Obika

Timeout said:
As you might expect from the eaterie occupying space opposite Gucci in the Superbrands section of Selfridges, glass and steel Obika is something of a looker. It serves food - and wine that comes care of Liberty Wines, one of the top Italian wine importers to the UK. Crucially, the 'bar' overlooks the catwalk of shoppers, providing some pleasurably fashionable entertainment for solitary lunchers.

Dave did:
Well we struggled to find the bar overlooking a catwalk, but over a nice glass one wine (a liquid lunch if you will), my parents and I watched on as the 'overly feminate' Gucci male staff (as eloquently described by my dear mother) faff about with some horrible looking, yet very expensive bags (I'm not one for fashion!).

We also noticed another female shopper choose to go to the changing room to try on a new belt!?!

To top it off, 'pushy mother' came to the fore once more, and demanded that our waiter sign my 1000 Things book. The poor guy didn't have a clue what was going on and wasn't sure whether to put his own name or some sort of alias! In the end he signed it and quickly made an exit. His name's Ricardo by the way!



38 down...962 Things to go!

#231 - Eat your way around Selfridges

Timeout said:
Selfridges Foodhall has an outstanding collection of enlightening edibles. You'll find the very best of fresh and cooked meat, fish, cheese, fruit, freshly baked pretzels, pies from the Square Pie Company, caviar from Caviar Kaspia, plus the wonderfully extravegant Moet champagne and oyster bar

Dave did:
From the above statement you'd think I'd be reporting back on some unbelievably posh grub that I tried out for the first time, and given the prices they charge something I'd never be able to try again. But no, alas I went for the free taster on offer today, and that free taster was...





...kiddies biscuits!

Oh yes, but not any normal kiddy biscuit, butter shortbread with fruity bits...and it was nice!


37 down...963 Things to go!

NEWSFLASH - Gorilla Update!

The BBC have put up a photo of yours truly on their website!

Check it out...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/7008863.stm

Gotta love that lucky shirt!

#209 - Admire the city from Tower Hill

Timeout said:
There was a bronze age settlement here, then a Roman village, then the church of All Hallows-by-the-Tower. More than 70 prisoners were executed here, with the dispatch of two prostitutes and a one-armed soldier in 1780 marking the end of a bloody era

Dave did:

Never one to stop for a rest, I noticed on my gorilla run that I passed Tower Hill, and so we just had to go back for the photo op and tick off another of my 1000 Things!



36 down...964 Things to go!

#21 - Watch the Great Gorilla Run

Timeout said:
Once a year, hundreds of primates take over London's streets for the Great Gorilla Run, an annual charity event that features people dressed up as monkeys. The run is organised to raise money to protect the endangered gorillas of Rwanda.

Dave did:
Well first things first...I didn't so much watch the run as participate in it! I mean come on, it hardly seems fair to go and watch a charity race, when you can easily sign up to raise some money yourself and in the process get back some of your long lost fitness! ...or so logic would dictate.

Unfortunately my life is far from logical (as this blog has probably illustrated far more than I can try explaining here!), so having trained for all of 2 weeks back at the start of August, and then gone on holiday for 2 weeks, and fallen ill with man-flu for another two weeks after that...the fitness part of it was out of the question! I did, however, manage to raise around £250 in sponsorship, so not all was lost!

So today was the day of the run, and after a lovely sleep on my couch (my visiting parents had occupied the bed) we headed over with my gorilla costume in tow. I arrived to find around 300 gorillas in various costumes all warming up for the big event.



Among these gorillas were some celebrities as well...Phil Tufnell with the BBC crew beside him, and Bill Oddie! My reliable (if not a little pushy) mother managed to get good ol' Bill to even sign my 1000 Things book as proof that I completed this task before me!



For my fancy dress I opted for my oversized Chicago Bulls shirt (a momento from my job training out there last year...that same shirt managed to get me onto the big tv screens during the game, so it must have some good luck - and might get me on BBC tv!).

Stages to becoming a Gorilla

Stage 1: Stepping into some gorilla shoes

Stage 2: Become a gorilla that wants to be noticed!

Stage 3: Attach your face

Stage 4: Strike the pose!

The run itself was actually pretty good fun, and the first 5km were pretty straight forward too! At first I was determined to keep my gorilla mask on throughout the whole run, and I survived up until that 5km mark when the sun suddenly came out in full force and I suddenly felt like I was breathing in a sauna!!!



I managed to keep pace with a number of fellow gorillas, including a scuba-gorilla, a Baywatch-Pamela-Anderson-Gorilla, and a pair of hawaiian apes! The crowds quickly gathered around the central London course, and what with wearing a mask the freedom of expression was very liberating - running up to random tourists and posing for photos, high fiving passers by, and attempting to convert other people out for their daily run to join us as it "wasn't too late!".

Coming into the last 2km, an old man who must have been around 60 passed me on the run in his gorilla outfit. The guy looked half dead but had his 12 year old son playing pace maker for him. The second he passed me I knew the gauntlet had been thrown down....there was no way this pensioner was going to finish ahead of me in the race! And so it was I would run ahead, and then slow again to a walking pace (the sun-effect meant I couldnt last all gorilla'd up for more than a few hundred meters at a time) and then the old man would jog past me a few minutes later, at which point I'd start running again to pass him and slow once more...

In the final 1km the spirit of the moment took me over and I went for broke, giving out the high-fives, making gorilla chants as loud as I possibly could, and making sure I kept my anonymous mask on at all times!!



Crossing the finishing line with Bill Oddie waiting with a broad smile probably wasn't the most rewarding of experiences, but the medal he passed on to me, and the water and bananas being offered on a table behind him made up for that!

A winner NEVER loses his sense of style!

A winner is ALWAYS happy to pose for the camera!

A winner should NEVER let the truth come out like this!

Overall it was a fantastic morning, and given my lack of training, relatively poor health, and the very warm day, completing the 7km in 47 minutes was a very modest time (my 5km practice runs without costume usually took me 30minutes...and that was in the late evenings!!)

Will I do it again? Well the 47min benchmark has been set, and I've got my own gorilla costume now so hey...maybe!





35 down...965 Things to go!