A bit of that

This could be a long post, All the pictures were taken on the same day, mostly in the evening. The first few though were taken in the morning, after getting off the tube at Barbican. My first stop was St. Martin's Le-Grand which runs from the Rotunda near the museum of London down towards St.Pauls Cathedral.

I was filling ins some gaps on this morning, so the next  stop was a  few streets away at the lovely named Love Lane. Round the corner on Wood Street is the headquarters of the the City of London Police and most times I have walked down Love Lane there have been lots of police vans, cars and occasionally horsed. Taking photographs here may have resulted in some questioning, but luckily there is also a lovely little garden on the corner of Aldermanbury; I love these quite,peaceful gardens that are dotted around the city, and quite like the resultant picture too.

My final picture of the morning was at Brewers Hall Garden, which as a garden is quite a contrast to that in Love Lane,. Its just a small alley and seated area with some brick flower beds on the side of London Wall, with lots of traffic going past. There are plenty of better options for a quite read or spot of lunch. Of note though is that this is the garden of the Brewers Hall, one of the oldest livery companies and on of the first to have its own hall. The statue of the gardener was originally at Moorgate but relocated here in 2005.

And now to the evening. The plan was to walk from work to Barbican and then past Smithfield Market and to Holborn, where I would fill in some of the gaps between Holborn and Fleet street, taking a few pictures along the way if something caught my interest.

On the south side of Smithfield market, there are a few littlle alleys that I hadn't been down before, so I had a quick look down a few of them. The first was Cloth Court were I noticed a rather bizarre post-it note stuck on somebody's front door, stating "What smell were you grateful for today?".

The other alley I stopped off at here was Barley Mow Passage, of which there is not much to say other then I like the name.

The next couple of pictures are perhaps a little open to debate as to which street they cross off the list. The first was taken from Holborn Viaduct looking down onto Farringdon Street. Is it a picture of a statue on the bridge of Holborn Viaduct or of the Farrrigndon Street? I counted it as Farrigndon Street. Its the sort of question I have pondered before;Could I for instance, stand at a crossroads and take one picture and cross off four streets?

The next picture was taken on the steps down from Holborn Viaduct down to Farrindon Street. Again I counted is as Farringdon Street.Not sure what my reasoning was, but perhaps I should have reasoned differently.

Now moving in between Holburn and Fleet Street, my next stop was Thavies Inn, where they was not too much to photograph. Whilst it doesn't make a great image, I was interested by the contrasting shapes and patterns in the next image.

I think at this point of the evening I started struggling a little for inspiration. Sometimes with these areas that are a little bit further from work, there is a nagging feeling that firstly I don't want to have to keep coming back to the area, and secondly as the nights start to get shorter, that it is going to get harder to visit these locations. So here is one uninspired shot from Breams Buildings, where (apologies to) the lady looks as though were it not for the socks, she might be from a bond movie and capable of stabbing someone with sharp points from her shoes.

Just off from here is Rolls Passage., where I believe the Master of the Rolls originally lived. This is the title of the second most senior judge in England and Wales, and the position dates from at least 1286. Originally the roll was that of a clerk responsible for keeping the "Rolls" or records of the Court of Chancery.

Down the side of the Maughan Library, part of Kings College is Cliffords Inn Passage, where the following uninspired picture maybe even more uninspiring than that of the bod villain.

The other end of the passage leads onto Fleet Street, and I headed along here in the direction of St.Pauls stopping to go down Red Lion Court, one of the stopping points of the Great Fire of London - here the fire came to a brick built house which slowed the fire down a little an enabled fire fighters time to demolish buildings and create a gap, thus preventing further spread of the fire.

The next alley off Fleet Street and parallel to Red Lion Court is Johnson's Alley, a twisty turny sort of alley were Dr. Samuel Johnson lived. The street is not however named after Dr. Johnson but Thomas Johnson, a city tailor who lived her during the reign of Elizabeth I.

Also of note and some relevance, is that on the wall to right their is a plaque dated 28th March 2001 commemorating the centenary of the first meeting of the British Institute of Professional Photographers, a the Anderton's Hotel which previously stood here.

The twists and turns lead to Gough Square, which features another residence of Dr. Johnson, as can been seen in the picture below.

The other end of the square leads to Gunpowder Square, where rather appropriately there is a cannon, and where I was quite precise with my aim.

Wine Office Court is probably famous to a lot of people for being the location of Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese pub. Many famous literary figures are said to have been regular drinkers here including Dr. Samuel Johnson, Mark Twain, Alfred Tennyson and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  The pub was associated for around fourty years with an African Grey Parrot called Polly. Polly was so famous, that when she died in 1926, here obituary was featured in more than 200 newspapers.

Sadly although having recently been to the pub myself from the end at which I approached the street, I was not aware that the pub was down the other end and so came away with a rather less interesting picture.

My final picture of the evening was from the nearby Printer Street.