LONDON St Pauls Cathedral

One of the icons of the tourist traps in London is St Pauls Cathedral, Sir Christopher Wrens masterpiece. It was built after the great fire of London burnt many of the churches of the time.

St Pauls Cathedral on  rare sunny summer day in London. Photo no 1546




Many will have seen the iconic second world war photos of St Pauls with London burning around it.
The lady of the house where we are staying in London took us out to Richmond park to show us an unusual view of St Pauls. It would take a camera with a very long lens to show it, but there is a spectacular view from 15 miles away on Richmond hill along a specially protected corridor through the Richmond Park vegetation and the buildings to London to see St Pauls in the distance. Its quite impressive to see St Pauls from that distance.

During our wanderings around London, we visited the inside of St Pauls. No photography is allowed inside the church but it is magnificent!
We then climbed up the 257 steps to the Whispering gallery. Lots of people try to whisper and be heard around the other side of the dome, it really works.
We then climbed a further 119 steps to the stone gallery. The view from there is brilliant and photography is allowed.

Photo of the bell tower from the golden gallery.

Then we climbed the additional 144 wrought iron steps to the golden gallery at the top (that's a total of 528 steps or 85metres).  From the top of these steps, before stepping outside, there is a small viewing hole which gives a view down to the cathedral floor -  this just confirms how far up you have actually climbed.

Photo of a windswept lady in red jacket on the golden gallery. Photo number 1596
The River Thames in the background.

Having done all that climbing up and down we then went to the crypt.  There are many tombs of past mililtary heros among them are Nelson and the Duke of Wellington.  Also there is a display of pictures of British events that have happened over the life of St Pauls.