Hey everyone!
Today I left the house at 7am with Jo and she dropped me at the station on her way to work. All good, but the only thing with my prepurchased train ticket was that the return leg to London had to be during off peak times. So I had to kill just over two hours at the station. Never mind! Found a nice warm waiting room and the time soon passed.
I got the fifty minute train to London Liverpool Street station and then walked the 15 minutes to the Museum of London. Today was another day of lugging a suitcase around, but today I also had a backpack and my little bag! My shoulders are quite sore but there wasn't anything else I could do. Luckily for 5 pounds the museum stored all my bags. Considering admission was free and I spent three hours in the museum, I didn't mind paying!
I had a really great three hours in the museum learning all about the history of London. The exhibition was divided into a few sections in chronological order - London before London, the Roman rule over Londinium, medieval London, 1550-1660 and 1660 to now. Here's a brief summary of what I learned...
I started in the London before London exhibition which was all about Neanderthals and stone tools that have been found. Then I got to the part about the Roman Empire having control of what they called Londinium. In AD 43 emperor Claudius and his army invaded London and the British leaders surrendered. They called the city Londinium, however this only lasted ten years from AD 50-60at which time Queen Boudica (who was mentioned on my Harry Potter walking tour last week) the queen of East Anglia invaded to try and defeat the Romans. She burned a lot of the city to the ground.
In AD 50 the Thames was 300m wide at low tide and 1000m at high tide. Today it is 100m wide!
In AD 410 the Romans left as they were under attack in France. This meant that what was once Londinium was now left a deserted ruin. Then the Saxons came and so began the next period - Medieval London AD 410-1158. In the 600s the Saxons built a town here called Lundenwic (London Port) to the west of the previous roman town. Here they built St Paul's Cathedral!
In the 1300-1600s, the Black Death killed up to 50 million people. The first bout in the 1300s killed 40,000 people, over half of London's population at the time. In 1665 the Great Plague occurred and within seven month 1/5 of London's population - 100,000 people - had died from the plague.
Just as London was recovering from the Great Plague, in 1666 the Great Fire of London occurred. It started in a bakery on Pudding Lane at 1am on the 2nd of September. It was never clarified as to how the fire started but it is believed the flame in the bakery oven wasn't put out overnight. As well, it had been a long hot summer, winds blew the fire from house to house and warehouses filled with timber, tar, rope and oil spread the fire more quickly. The fire raged for five days and burned down 4/5 of London. Soldiers and sailors had to use gunpowder to blow up houses making gaps the fire couldn't cross. The devastation caused was massive. 436 acres burned, 13200 houses burned down, 87/109 of London's churches burned down. Hardly anyone died but 100,000 people were left homeless. It took 50 years to rebuild London. The streets were widened and buildings were built out of brick and not wood.
The last part of the exhibition (1666-now) consisted of displays from the 1800s mainly and then clothes and artefacts from the 20th century. I liked the Beatles part and all the clothes from the 60s and 70s on display! I also found out that originally the famous London telephone boxes were meant to be green and silver but it was feared they would be a hazard so needed a bright colour to stand out. Hence the red!
London today has 50 resident communities of over 10,000 people from 33 nations. 300 languages are spoken and 14 major faiths practiced. The actual city of London borough has fewer than 10,000 residents but on weekdays 340,000 people commute there to work!
I really enjoyed the museum but was getting sick of lugging my case in the city centre. So I caught a bus to the borough of Islington where later on I would have a flat inspection for a possible place for me to live as of May! I decided to spend a few hours beforehand checking out the local area. I haven't taken any photos of the area though because I don't want to jinx myself and not get the room. So if I'm lucky enough to get it I'll take lots of pictures of the flat/surrounding area once I move in to show you all :)
I walked to the nearby tube station, Highbury & Islington and checked out all the shops. There seems to be a number of supermarkets, restaurants etc around which is good. I then walked to the Emirates stadium which is Arsenal's home ground. Couldn't resist, was only 20 minutes away! Went to a nearby park and had a bit of a rest. In summary, it's a great area with good shops and transport links.
Then at 5.30pm I went to the flat and met the girl who is moving out. Her name is Clementine and she's going to Ireland for four months. She was absolutely lovely, as was the flat. Coincidentally, her and two of the other girls went to Downing College in Cambridge that I visited the other day, and she had seven mutual friends on Facebook with James. What a small world!! The flat was clean, modern, had lots of storage space and is in a great location. Not going to talk too much about it because I don't want to get my hopes up but basically I'm going back there to meet the other three girls (who I would be living with if I moved in) and if they like me then it should be all good hopefully! Keep your fingers and toes crossed please, it's the perfect place!
Then I caught the bus then train to Lou's house in Carshalton, South of the city. I'm staying here for two nights before I leave for Dublin on Sunday! I'm exhausted, all that case lugging and walking is tiring!!
Love to all
Claire
Xoxox
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