Craig Cross's Blog, page 2

London blog: National Portrait Gallery

If you're coming to London for a week then you have to find time for at least one art gallery. You can't just do fun stuff for seven days, that's not allowed. Art gallery first, then fun. Do your homework first, then you can watch some telly later. This is the art gallery that I always recommend if you aren't particularly into art, because it's half-art and half-history. It's full of British kings and queens, politicians, scientists, writers... it's like walking through an illustrated...

London blog: Royal Observatory

When Christopher Wren started work on the Royal Observatory it was overlooking the rubbled wreck of Greenwich Palace at the bottom of the hill. Queen's House was still standing (it's still standing today) but it was another twenty years before he built the Seaman's Hospital (now called the Old Royal Naval College). So that fantastic view that we see today was just a big building site in 1675. I don't suppose he bothered coming all the way out to Greenwich very often because the city was...

London blog: Science Museum

The first thing you'll see are some original engines by James Watt and Trevithick: big Victorian steam machines about twenty feet tall, beams as thick as tree trunks. It would be great if they got them going again. Imagine the noises they must have made! They probably sounded like a cross between car crash and a kettle; all whistles, clatter and bangs. I'm looking for a button to fire them up again but they've all been locked off and polished so you can see your face in them. For most people...

London blog: Natural History Museum

If you lived near London as a little kid then you probably remember this place from the school holidays. I always ended up here because it's got dinosaurs in it and kids love dinosaurs. And now here I am, thirty-five years later... still a kid... wondering what they've done with the giant Diplodocus in the entrance hall. Where's Dippy gone? He was part of my youth! 150 million years he'd been standing there and they've replaced him with the bones of a big whale. The first photo you'll take...

London blog: London Film Museum

I wonder if they're still looking for the next James Bond. What they should do is go for somebody completely different next time, maybe Roger Moore minus the suit and toupee (ie. me). Somebody who did six months of judo when he was a kid (me) and drove a Mini Metro instead of an Aston Martin. Somebody, for example, who is me (I'm talking about me). Basically what I'm saying is, I think they should pick me. I actually applied for a job at MFI once thinking it was MI5 and ended up selling...

London blog: Clink Prison Museum

What do you get for committing a sin these days? Five Hail Marys and a couple of Our Fathers. I haven't been to church for years so I havent got a clue but I'm guessing they don't lock you up in the Clink Prison anymore. Because that's what happened when the Bishop of Winchester was in charge. Winchester Palace is long gone now but back in the 12th-century the bishop's writ stretched from here all the way down past the Globe and the Rose to the Tate. He wrote the laws, broke the laws, and...

London blog: Winchester Palace

You need to temper your expectations for this one because it's not a palace anymore -- it's a wall. So I don't want you dreaming about seeing a load of fancy French furniture and Renaissance paintings as you're walking past the Clink because there's none of that -- it's literally just a propped-up wall and a few flower pots on the floor. But it's still worth a quick look if you happen to be in the vicinity. Don't bother making a detour for it though. We're going to have to go back a few...

London blog: Leicester Square

Everybody looks wrecked in the morning but I'm the middle-aged kind of wrecked, where you roll out of bed feeling like you've only had five minutes kip. These sleeping kids in Leicester Square are the other type: they look like they're at the tail-end of a long night out that still hasn't ended yet. I'm glad I don't have to do that anymore -- I much prefer Leicester Square during the day. If you come here on a Friday or Saturday night then the crowds are unbelievable. It's the human...

London blog: London Buses

I'm fifth in line behind three beer bottles and a half-eaten hamburger in a sauce-splattered carton. The other guy standing here is trying to peel the pages of his rain-sodden newspaper apart while we're waiting for the bus to loom out of the morning mist. There's a stream of headlights approaching down the road but by the time they arrive they have revealed themselves to be cars. The electronic timetable has been stuck on three minutes for the last five minutes and two tourists are...

London blog: London buses

I'm fifth in line behind three beer bottles and a half-eaten hamburger in a sauce-splattered carton. The other guy standing here is trying to peel the pages of his rain-sodden newspaper apart while we're waiting for the bus to loom out of the morning mist. There's a stream of headlights approaching down the road but by the time they arrive they have revealed themselves to be cars. The electronic timetable has been stuck on three minutes for the last five minutes and two tourists are...