I headed away from Brick Lane back towards Liverpool Street Station and on the way managed to get another photograph of an ice cream van. This makes three I managed to get a decent shot of, the first becoming a painting in early 2009, the second a few weeks previously while in Portsmouth. From Liverpool Street I caught the bus back to London Bridge and took a little time to grab shots of both Southwark Cathedral and HMS Belfast/Tower bridge that I had seen multiple times that weekend already and not managed to before. It seemed like fate was driving me to get these photographs and I'm not one to ignore that.
After hopping on the Jubilee Line as far as Canary Wharf I wandered around trying to find the correct bus stop for the rail replacement bus to London City Airport (as I said travel was broken). By then my feet were really starting to hurt. While In Canary Wharf I got a few photos which was nice as the last time I was there the sun was rapidly going down. So very shiny all that steel and glass, there was also an interesting public sculpture that I could have sworn was a deep blue but all the photographs I took make it look like it was black.
The bus ride to London City Airport was quite enjoyable. Nothing really beats the underground for getting around London fast but the buses help connect the city together. Plus you get to see some interesting views if like me you prefer landscape to people watching. In particular I got quite a stunning view of The Dome from the Blackwall area.
I got off a stop early to see the Thames Barrier and was mightily impressed by the surrounding gardens. I had seen on the map that there were gardens on the north side of the barrier but really expected it to just be a large heathland or open park like space. In fact areas were very heavily manicured and others left to be more natural with many trees and a Cafe. A slightly surreal situation as I felt I was very far from any kind of residential area. In fact I was quite wrong, there is quite an impressive residential community in an area I would expect to be almost entirely industrial.
The Barrier itself was far more impressive than I expected from images I'd already seen. Surprisingly for such a mechanical monster it was quite relaxing, I imagine this was due to the beautiful day doing wonders for almost any object and my proximity to the river which as I have stated before seems to induce a profound sense of calm.
I then proceeded to walk to London City Airport and attempted to walk around the perimeter trying to find a good and unobstructed view. Walking to the terminal proved that there was no good unobstructed view from that side nor was there any sign of an official viewing platform. Not wanting to attract too much attention to myself and being quite aware of current security concerns I decided to go see if I could get a couple of quick shots from the bridge and call it a day. In fact what I found was that the bridge was inaccessible for pedestrians but there was a separate underpass with a great view of the runway and directly underneath the incoming flight path. I was scared half to death by a black private jet plane that stayed about 30mins then departed as quickly as it came.
I hung around for a while getting a few photos of the terminal and planes but realised I was really too far away for my little compact camera to get anything close up. I also had the definite feeling that I might be doing something potentially a little naughty and had had that feeling since I walked into the general vicinity of the airport. In the end I crossed over to the other side of the docks and spent more time watching, photographing and filming the planes as they came in. Of course from where I was I wasn't going to get any people in my shots so it was more a curiosity thing than any real expectation of artwork coming from it.
I will finish up this excessive post with a quick note on the confusing return journey. As I said before, transportation links in this area were a little broken due to weekend engineering works. On the way home I ended up taking the DLR one stop then a Rail Replacement Bus to another DLR station and almost remained on the bus going back the way I came. Frankly the guys running the bus must have stopped caring and while they were friendly enough they were more concerned in having a laugh while moving the herds of people around to mention we had got to our final destination. After working out where I had ended up I realised the bus had dropped us at a non functioning DLR but within walking distance of Canary Wharf. Happily walking to Canary Wharf gave me a second shot at that view I had seen earlier on the bus of the Dome.
Definitely a day of second chance photographs.
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