A Day at the Hall

Originally posted August 10, 2009

Sunday took us to the old London County Hall located on the South Bank next to Westminster Bridge and now houses the Movieum, the London Aquarium, restaurants and the ticket office for the London Eye.
Admitedly this was the only nastly day we had during our whole trip. Everyone thinks it rains constantly in Great Britain, especially over the two week Wimbledon tournament. Truth is, it was beautiful bright sunshine for the entire week we were there except for this one day. We were lucky though as although the sky looked very menacing all day, it only rained while we were actually inside!

I haven’t been to the South Bank in many years for obvious reasons. At that time pretty much the only things there was the London Aquarium and a bunch of restaurants so I was very pleasantly surprised to see that not only was the London Eye there now but also quite a few more museums/attractions.

The Movieum is one such attraction and it is housed amongst the corridors and offices of the old London County Hall, which with its wide staircases and handcrafted wood paneling is impressive in and off itself. This museum was an unexpected treasure as it gave a great history of film and television as it relates to Britain and some very unexpected productions were actually filmed at some of the famous UK film studios.

Made in Britain – Hundreds of International films have been made on British soil including Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Superman, Batman & Alien to name but a few.

It was amazing to see just how much of a contribution the UK has had on international movie making.
Thankfully we missed the raid while we were inside the museum but we decided to brave the crowds / more rain and bought tickets to view London from the sky. The London Eye is an amazing piece of engineering and viewing it up close and personal was a very cool event. Each of the capsules have two bands around them that rotate as the big wheel moves around, keeping the capsules very stable and upright.

The views of London as this mechanical marvel rotates its way around are stunning and well worth the price tag. All I would have wished was that it was a sunny day so that we could have seen further.

After the London Eye can the London Aquarium. I still maintain that this is one of the best in the World and definitely worth a trip.