Lost In Millwall
I usually like going to the New Den to see a football match, as to get from Dalston Junction station to the ground is simple and it is a stadium with good viewing.
I knew that going yesterday wasn’t going to be easy, as South Bermondsey station, which is connected to the ground by a walkway was closed due to engineering works.
So I went the way I usually go, which is to take the Overground to Canada Water station and then get one of the single-decker buses to a stop named Millwall FC.
The bus was full, but the usually-friendly Millwall supporters were not bothering me. Sometimes, I think that their reputation is worse than the reality. But I arrived at the ground, as I intended, a few minutes before kick-off.
It should be said, that London’s talking buses make it easy to find your way in strange parts of London. Other cities should follow the example.
The match was probably Ipswich’s worst display of the season, with the spark of the previous Championship encounter against QPR completely missing. The only positive thing to say, is that Millwall played well enough to stay up, so that should be another easy away game to get to, next season.
After the match, my normal route home via South Bermondsey and London Bridge stations was not on, so I decided to walk to TfL’s recommended alternative of Surrey Quays station.
I got lost, as there were no maps in this part of London. Where I live in Hackney, there are liths and maps all over the place.
So in the end I got to the station by walking in a great circle.
As I suspect the works at South Bermondsey will be going for some time, something needs to be done.
Spitalfields For A Gluten-Free Meal
As I found at Nottingham recently, restaurants that can do a good gluten-free mea, tend to cluster. I’ve eaten in three places in Spitalfields; Carluccio’s. Leon and Pizza Express, but a new one called Canteen has opened.
Canteen In Spitalfields
All gluten-free meals are marked and they also state.
Other dishes can be made gluten-free on request.
Why don’t a lot more restaurants say that, as I know from experience many good chefs can make food gluten free.
The Spitfire Gate At Spitalfields Market
I spotted this as I walked into Spitalfields Market today.
The Spitfire Gate At Spitalfields Market
The Internet provides the answer as to why a gate is named after Spitfire W3311. This article contains this extract.
The gate is called Spitfire Mk.Vb W3311 Gate because the Spitalfields fruit and veg traders clubbed together to buy a Spitfire fighter plane in World War II. They named it ‘Fruitation’.
London is full of little stories like this! But I suspect others are too, although London seems to mark them more!
Cycling Superhighway On Cable Street
Cycling Superhighway, CS3, on Cable Street, seems to be very safely laid out.
As there wasn’t much traffic in the area, I think I’ll give it a try, by taking a tain to Shadwell. As this map shows, it’s pretty straight too.
Two Blue Plaques In Cable Street
I generally note the blue plaques I pass, as I walk around. This morning, I was on the way to pick something up in the area and passed two.
The Angel Of Cable Street
Hannah Billig seems to have been a remarkable doctor. But then she was awarded a George Medal for courage and bravery in the Blitz and she was called the Angel of Cable Street.
Jack Kid Berg
This plaque to Jack Kid Berg was a hundred metres or so further on. He seemed to have had an good and long life.
I also seem to remember that along with Ted Kid Lewis he was one of my father’s sporting heroes.
Will Farringdon Station Become A Destination In Itself?
Until Crossrail is opened, I don’t think we can know the effect that it will have on London’s transport systems. I put a few of my thoughts in this post about London’s airports, but at the time I hadn’t read read Crossrail’s description of the new Farringdon station on its web site. Here’s a key paragraph.
Situated at the intersection of a new east-west and north-south axis, it will be possible to directly connect with three of London’s five airports (with single interchange to the other two), providing a highly desirable railway connection between Heathrow and Gatwick. We believe this interchange will become so important to London that Farringdon will re-emerge as a destination in itself.
I couldn’t agree more.
There will need to be a new Airports Commission, as Crossrail will be the London’s biggest gamechanger since the Underground.
Londoners Are Wimps About Shopping!
This morning I needed a few things at Waitrose, so I did what C and I used to do in Suffolk. I went to the store at the Angel early about an hour after it opened. It was very uncrowded. In Suffolk, half the population would have been there, as they all generally getup early.
But obviously they don’t in London. Coming back, the bus had about five passengers.
London Shows Contactless Cards Work On Buses
This article on Finextra, shows that what the Dismal Jimmies predicted when you could use your contactless cards for bus travel didn’t happen. Here’s the two paragraphs.
Transport for London is celebrating a successful one-year anniversary of the use of contactless payments cards on the capital’s buses, as it prepares to extend the technology to the entire transit network in 2014.
Since it was launched on Thursday 13 December 2012 when 2,061 customers made 2,586 journeys, more than 6.5 million journeys have now been made using an American Express, MasterCard or Visa Europe contactless payment card.
So now we have another good thing, that the banks have done for us in addition to the cash machine.
I hope, I’m young enough to be able to use my contactkess bank card on public transport all over the world. It would certainly have helped in Bilbao and a lot of other places I’ve visited this year.
Cinderella Is My Friend
Most Sundays, I go South and East from where I live to Canary Wharf, the Thames or Greenwich. Today was no exception, as I wanted to see the new roof on Canary Wharf Crossrail station and get a bit of shopping in the excellent Waitrose at Canary Wharf.
Today, I picked up the Docklands Light Railway at Shadwell, as I often do.
I’ve referred to this line as Cinderella before, as in the current vogue for grand railways and other schemes, she seems to get forgotten, as she trundles passengers reliably around the East of London, giving superb views of the canals, docks and buildings, both old and new.
But then she is like me; a London mongrel, with an ancestry from all over the place. The railway was born out of the need for to create a transport system on the cheap. The trouble is, that the engineers and staff, felt that despite the budget, they could create something special.
And they did!
They’ve now even created audio guides to each line, as this poster advertises.
Advertising The DLR Audio Guides
I don’t think they’d work so well for the Underground.
Cinderella just has so much to show you!
And where else can kids of all ages, play at driving the trains? Copenhagen and Turin.
But why oh why, is there not another use of the technology in the UK or the wider world? I just think, Cinderella isn’t sexy enough for the great and good. But then she’ll still be here, when all of the current bunch of idiots are pushing up the daisies.
I Meet An Ipswich Town Cockney
On the 38 bus coming back from the Angel, I was approached by another Ipswich Town fan. As usual in this sort of weather, I was wearing an appropriate woolly hat.
He told me he’d been born in the Royal Free Hospital in the Liverpool Road, which probably makes him a genuine Cockney, according to this map.
His parents had then moved to Suffolk.
I’m not, but how many Town fans are genuine Cockneys? For various reasons like the closure of Central London maternity units, very few genuine Cockneys are born these days.
The Anonymous Widower 