2 July 2015 - The Museum of London

Ah, the relief of a bit of cooler weather and we all feel energised again.  Not that another visit to another museum thrills certain members of the family but while we are in London there are certain things that I would like to see!  We all walked through Little Venice, on our favourite canal walk, and noted that the heat had caused big algal blooms on the still murky water of the canal.

Algal blooms on Regents Canal

 We were topping up our Oyster cards at Paddington when one of the machines gobbled up a 20 pound note!  After a fair bit of fuss and bother, we filled in a form and then had to take it to another part of the station to be reimbursed. Luckily we were in no hurry!  While Karl waited in the queue (we are used to queues by now of course!) the kids and I trotted down to see Paddington Bear as Tim hadn't seen him yet.

All the fuss after the machine ate our money!

Another sit with Paddington!

We'll look after you!

Finally, we were on our way to Barbican and the Museum of London.  London itself, the Roman city of Londinium and Anglo Saxon city  Lundenwic, on the banks of the River Thames has an amazing history.

The Thames was named by the Romans: the Tamesa, the flowing one. (Why did the English put the "h" in Thames?)  The Thames actually was once a wide "braided" stream originating from the Rhine before Britain became separated from Europe.

Original 3rd Century Roman mosaics

3rd Century relief - which had be recycled into a wall and was rescued!

 The Roman Empire was vast and Julius Caesar himself made it to London!  However, Roman Londinium was virtually abandonned and from the late 5th century, Anglo-Saxons began to inhabit the area and renamed it Lundenwic. The Anglo-Saxons ruled the city until 11th Century.  The London Wall remained intact and there are remnants of it standing to this day!

There were many Viking invasions from AD 830's, when Alfred the Great regained English control, London became known as Lundenburh.  Then Sweyn Forkbeard (I LOVE that name and can just picture a stocky viking with a fiery red forked beard!) unsuccessfully attacked London and eventually his son, Cnut the Great, gained control of not only London but also the rest of England in 1016.  Somehow, Edward  the Confessor, his step son, became king in 1042 and it was he who had Westminster Abbey built.  When Edward died there was a crisis as to who should succeed him and this led to the Norman invasion of England!  I hope I have got that all correct!

Please look after this bear....Paddington dress ups at London Museum

 The Museum is a well presented chronological presentation of London to the present day.  I enjoyed the presentations about the Plague and the Great Fire of London as well as war time London and general history across the decades.

One of the many play areas throughout the museum.

We were also interested in the Zeppelin presentation especially as we had seen Germany's side of the story at the Zeppelin Museum in Friedrichshafen.  War time must have been terrifying in London.  80,000 were killed or injured in WWII in London.

The thought of war makes me shudder.

If you saw one of these coming over  the night sky, would you really take time to identify it?

Last of all, after the big kids had headed home, Karl, Luke and I went to check on the remains of the Wall of London.  I am always fascinated by structures so old standing to the present time!  There was a delightful little medicinal garden planted nearby with good explanations of what herbs were used for what ailments.

Apparently had platforms for catapults!

Medicinal herb garden

In summary, I thought it was a fantastic museum with lots of hands on activities and videos to make the walk through history very accessible and interesting.  It is also free! Luke, of course, didn't want to leave!

Genuine tube sign

A rather hot and crowded Tube ride home was the consequence of staying in central London until peak hour!  At least there was a cool breeze to guide us home.