Christmas Day Dawn Walk in London Town
The brainchild of Pete Berthoud of Discovering London, qualified Westminster Guide. The idea: to enjoy London when it’s at its most empty, bereft of public transport. The rest of the nation tucked up in their beds, dreaming about what Santa has bestowed. Setting off from Brentford at 05:30 precisely, it took 26 minutes to reach Waterloo Place. We renedezvous’d with our intrepid companions at Admiralty Arch and then, led by Pete, enjoyed a two hour mooch around the silent streets of one of the world’s busiest cities, finishing up back at Trafalgar Square for celebratory hot chocolate, bacon butties, single malt, fine cognac, cigars and Quality Street.
A minicab here, some dozing tramps there. Peering through the window of the occasional building we saw the odd night security guard faithfully at his post. They were our only company. Lovely. I’d do it again.
Update: Matt Brown, who was on our tour, has written eloquently about his take on proceedings, here. Blogger Ian Visits appears to have had the same bright idea as us and written it up here.
This must have been marvelous. It looks so beautiful and wonderfully empty. I always wanted to do this in NYC at Christmas.
What a fabulous idea. Thanks for sharing the photos. Stunning they are!
Excellent photos! Wonderful idea of a dawn walk! I would LOVE to go along one day. I dream of visiting London and a walk about with historians would be epic! Merry Christmas to all of you! Hope the double socks and longjohns kept y’all warm!
Thank you so much for this post! Ever since I first read of the walk I thought it would be so much fun. Now I have been able to see it vicariously through you. Someday I’ll make it to London to make the walk myself.
I love London. Its a beautiful city and so much to see and do there. I too would love to walk the steets again at night. I did that often in the late 1960s. I live in America now but England will be forever home and I will always love her.
Janice
I too would love to do this again at night. Like yourself, I often walked through the London streets at night during the 1960’s – such good memories.
Thanks for the wonderful look at London early in the morning, especially with the Christmas lights on.
Suzi
Thanks for all the comments. It was a super experience, and reinforced my love of our wonderful city, so much goes unappreciated in the hubbub during the busy times. Many writers characterise London as a living, breathing being and you could sense her having a bit of a rest and recoup. It wasn’t part of the walk, but driving in we noticed that none of the bridges was lit up, nor the Houses of Parliament, which was a bit of a pity. But I guess in these energy conscious times it’s a lot of electricity to use for the benefit of a handful of people at that time of the morning.
Wonderful photographs and I love the idea of the dirty old town taking a rest for a few hours.