On our free Wednesday in London, we decided to make our way to Greenwich and ended up spending the entire day checking out the sights there! We then spent our last few days in London relaxing and checking out a few more exhibits.
View of London from Greenwich
After we public-transported ourselves to Greenwich on Wednesday morning, we started off our tourism at the Cutty Sark. The Cutty Sark is a tea clipper that was built in 1869 and is now on display along the waterfront, similar to the SS Great Britain in Bristol. The Cutty Sark was built to transport 600,000 kg of tea from China and bring British goods over to that part of the world. As steamships started to take over and the Suez Canal was opened, its life as a tea clipper was short lived and it only made 8 voyages as a tea clipper before it started transporting wool and other goods from Australia. She was one of the fastest, and one of the last(est), tea clippers to be built.
Exploring the Cutty Sark was a lot of fun and instead of being done up as it would have been in its heyday, like the SS Great Britain, it was mostly exhibits, with some accommodations arranged as they would have been. One of the coolest things about the Cutty Sark was that it is actually lifted up 3 m from the ground to take pressure off the hull, meaning that visitors can go underneath the ship!
After picking up sandwiches from a local coffee shop for lunch, we wandered through Greenwich Park and hiked up to the Royal Observatory Greenwich. The view of London from there was amazing! The Royal Observatory was established in the 1600s and was the first state-funded scientific centre. Over the years, quite a lot of astronomy research has been undertaken here by famous astronomers. It is also home to the Prime Meridian, where longitude equals 0 degrees – everywhere on Earth is measured East or West from this line. There was a HUGE line-up to get your picture taken straddling the Prime Meridian, with a foot in each hemisphere, so we decided to opt out of that one. However, after we'd walked around the area and saw the exhibits about longitude and time-keeping, we happened upon the actual telescope that defines the location of the Prime Meridian! The area was fairly empty, so we took our own (super low key) Prime Meridian photo.
Time-keeping and longitude are something that we take for granted nowadays but figuring out how to accurately measure time and let everyone around the world know what the time is in their specific area was a tough problem to solve. Even harder than that, once the time zones had been developed, sailors wanted to figure out how to measure longitude from wherever they were in the world. Since there are no fixed points in the middle of the ocean, it was tough to determine position. Latitude can be determined by completing calculations on the sun and stars, but longitude is harder to measure as it is based on time.
The solution to this problem was continued at an exhibit down the hill at the National Maritime Museum. In 1714, the British government offered a reward, equivalent to £2 million today, to anyone who could solve the problem of finding longitude at sea. Possible solutions were developed that involving time-keeping, lunar distances, magnetism, signaling and Jupiter's moons. It took almost 60 years for the prize to be awarded and in the end, time-keeping proved to be the best way, although lunar distances did work for some time.
The solution to this problem was continued at an exhibit down the hill at the National Maritime Museum. In 1714, the British government offered a reward, equivalent to £2 million today, to anyone who could solve the problem of finding longitude at sea. Possible solutions were developed that involving time-keeping, lunar distances, magnetism, signaling and Jupiter's moons. It took almost 60 years for the prize to be awarded and in the end, time-keeping proved to be the best way, although lunar distances did work for some time.
We explored a few more exhibits in the National Maritime Museum (and spotted the section about Newfoundland!) before finishing off our time in Greenwich with some Chinese food for dinner at a nearby restaurant. That night, we went out to Sophie's New Year's party. Due to our enthusiasm the night before, the three of us ended up chilling out on Thursday and only left the flat for brunch and to see the Theory of Everything at the cinema.
Friday was our last full day in London and we spent it checking out a couple of exhibits at the British Museum and the Tate Britain. We finished off our time in the UK by going out for one last family dinner in London. It was definitely sad to say goodbye to everyone and leave the UK.
Friday was our last full day in London and we spent it checking out a couple of exhibits at the British Museum and the Tate Britain. We finished off our time in the UK by going out for one last family dinner in London. It was definitely sad to say goodbye to everyone and leave the UK.
Unfortunately our flight on the way home was delayed due to baggage issues at Heathrow and then we had to make a stop in Shannon, Ireland to refuel before crossing the Atlantic. Let's just say that for a direct flight, the journey ended up being quite a bit longer than expected!
In case you missed them, here are the other posts on our trip to the UK over Christmas:
Bristol Monday
Cotswolds Weekend
And the travel video we made of our trip to England can be found here!
Here are some more photos from our time in Greenwich, and London in general:
In case you missed them, here are the other posts on our trip to the UK over Christmas:
Bristol Monday
Cotswolds Weekend
And the travel video we made of our trip to England can be found here!
Here are some more photos from our time in Greenwich, and London in general:
