When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.

Thus said the irrepressible Samuel Johnson and I have to agree with the great man.  London is exciting, educational, and original, compelling etc. etc. it is all these things and more.  I can only compare it to one other city I have visited, New York, and although different historically both cities have many shared experiences that make them both truly exciting places to visit.

London has so many different choices from theatre, musical and serious drama, gallery’s with treasures that are endless to behold, museums that are challenging intellectually and educationally. Historic places to visit from the Tower of London to the Houses of Parliament.

Having stayed at a hotel just off the Tottenham Court Road I walked but a few miles down past Denmark Street, where Dick James signed The Beatles and Elton John to his publishing company, on the right just a quarter of a mile or so is Soho, where Dylan Thomas helped keep the London inn keepers solvent in the 1950’s and Damien Hirst plotted his rise to world domination. 

 

Just a little further down is the theatre district where Keane, Garrick, Irving, Olivier, Gielgud, Richardson and Burton all triumphed and gained their deserved reputations.  After a short stroll you enter two of the country’s great treasures the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery both equally compelling, both equally enjoyable.  A couple of minutes walk and you arrive in Whitehall where the history of the UK has been shaped 10 Downing Street, The War Cabinet Rooms and The Cenotaph to be eventually met by the belligerent statue of Winston Churchill and the Houses of Parliament. Whilst in London I walked all the way down these streets taking in how condensed an area could cause so much history and excitement.  I continued over Westminster Bridge taking in the stunning vista of the River Thames and turned onto the South Bank to be greeted by the London eye and then followed by the National theatre. 

I have been to London many times before but my decision to walk this distance gave me chance to take in the sheer excitement and brevity of what London has to offer you and this but small walk is a drop in the proverbial ocean to what remains to be seen and admired.  Having arrived home to the North West of England I can now appreciate Johnson’s statement, ‘When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.’

London I say goodbye to you now, but I will be back.