5/9/99 Sunday GREENWICH 2, PROMS

2nd day in London, I woke up in the morning as scheduled and went to Greenwich. This time, Sanna-san, a national staff of the company I used to work, kindly showed her neighborhood.

She lives in Blackheath where is just next to Greenwich. It takes about 20 minutes by BR from the central of London to Blackheath. Blackheath is a lovely place, where is very quiet and bright such like Hamstead. There are lots of nice restaurants around the station.

Blackheath's inhabitants love there very much, and call there ''Village''. We went to the market through the park from the Greenwich station on foot at a slow speed. It was a quite hot day, although in September already, and people put sleeveless wears. I had been cautious about the coldness in the U.K. , but it was unnecessary. In such nice weather, I really enjoyed to watch a rose garden, lots of flowers, and deer in the park. All of them made me relax.

From the most famous observetry (I mentioned about it in the page for Greenwich before) on the way down to the market, I could watch the Millenium Dome, one of my purpose of this trip, which was still under construction.
The left photo is extracted from Time Out. That is the dome. It is scheduled to open at 0:00 in 2000 and said that Prince William will cut the ribbon. I am sure that he will be a symbol of the next century for the British. It has a lots of horns and looks funny for me. Even the completion of the dome, it is said that the horns remain there, because they need to hang the floating parts of the dome. It is scheduled to be held the greatest exhibition of human in history, and also to be performed somthing else including plays.
About this dome, I heard the pros and cons from my friends live in London. Someone said that ''it's good, because it should become a tidy place after the reclamation work where used to be an industrial zone'' or ''it's an archiecture worthy of of the symbol of the next century. '' and the others said anxiously that ''how they are going to use the dome and site after the exhibition.''

Addtion to the dome, please let me metion the other constructions concerned Millenium.
The left photo shows one of the world largest Ferris Wheel, called 'London Eye'. It is quite large and has 32 passenger capsules and each capsule is able to carry 25 men. (I don't know how to sit in it together. ) During my visit in London, there was some news about an accident of it. Hope to open in time, January 2000, and I really want to try it !!

The right photo shows the bridge, called 'Millenium Bridge' which is scheduled to be built across the Thames in front of St. Paul. (I guess this photo shows the bridge watching from St. Paul.)The bridge cross the Thames is the first one since Tower Bridge was constructed in 1894, so, it must be a 'Millenium' architecture. It will open in April 2000.
Well, return to the walk with Sanna-san, we walked down to the Greenwich market and walked aroud there. The market is called 'Art & Craft market' and many young artists in London sell their handmade works. There are various kinds of things, like ceramics, pictures, unique accessories, and bibs, etc...I bought a handwritten pretty photoframe.
Sanna-san has a dream to sell her handmade candles or aromatic stuff in the market when she retire. I love it.

We popped in an old fashoned busy pub (I forgot the name...) along the river. The view from the pub was also good.

We went back to Blackheath and had lunch in the restaurant there. According to Sanna-san, the most of the restaurants in Greenwich are for tourists, but the most in Blackheath are for regular customers and so it is better to eat in there.
I remember when I visited Greenwich before, I could not decide which restaurant I should go, and I had chinese noodles in the end.
So, I would like to recommmed you to visit Blakheath as well when you visit Greenwich.

After the lunch, I visited her quite gorgeous flat and then went to Royal Albert Hall, to Proms, which is also one of my target of this trip.
Thank you very much, Sanna-san! I really had an unforgettable day in Greenwich.

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