Monday 11th November 2024.
Awoken early again, this time for school but fortunately Anna, Andrew’s Au Pair, gets him ready and after his breakfast, takes him to school. We had a more leisurely morning before heading to Westminster pier to get on the Uber “River Clipper” and headed to Greenwich; today we are going to visit the Cutty Sark, the famous Tea Clipper.
When we booked the river Boat trip, naturally we ticked the concession box, but when we arrived at the pier, the “jobs-worth ticket checker” asked us why we had!!!! We’re pensioners we said, not acceptable she said. To qualify we had to have a London bus pass, ours wasn’t good enough; Sadiq Khan looking after his woke lefties no doubt!!!!
Our intention was to stay on the boat to the end (Barking) to get our monies worth but unfortunately they only go as far as Barking in the rush hours, oh dear, so forced to got off at Greenwich.
After a quick diversion into the high street for a coffee and a bun at Greg’s, we went into the attraction, and attraction it is. Since the major fire back in 2007 and the major restoration that was forced to take place, the old ship is now quite a sophisticated visit. It has been raised in its “dry dock” and there is a roof around the waterline with exhibitions and cafe below the keel. My last visit was probably in the early 60’s; quite a difference; this was Christine’s first visit.
Catty Sark was built in Dumbarton, (Scotland) in 1869. Its owner John “Jock” Willis, designer Hercules Linton and many of its crew members over the years were from Scotland. But despite its proud Scottish heritage, London was to be Cutty Sark’s home port. Her maiden voyage departed London on 15th February 1870, bound for Shanghai. Cutty Sark was built exclusively for the China tea trade. Tea that has been enjoyed in Asia for centuries, but it did not reach Britain until the 1650’s. Later in its history she carried coal and wool from Australia. The downfall of these fast, sleek tea clippers was steam and the opening of the Suez Canal in “1869”, the canal wasn’t deep enough for their draft, so Cutty Sark was sold in 1892 to a Portuguese company and re-named “Ferreira” and her home port was Lisbon. In 1922 it changed hands again and was re-named “Maria do Amparo”, also sailing out of Lisbon.
In 1922 a “Wilfred Dowman” purchased the re-named “Cutty Sark” and turned it into a training school in Falmouth (Cornwall). After his death, it was transferred to the Thames Nautical Training College in Greenhithe (Kent) in 1938. Here she became an auxiliary to HMS Worcester and was moored up-alongside.
By 1954 she ceased to be useful as a cadet ship and was transferred to a special dry dock that was specially built in Greenwich. HRH the Duke of Edinburgh laid the foundation stone of the dry dock and became the patron of the Cutty Sark in June 1953.
Today the Cutty Sark is a preserved, Grade 1 listed monument and is a museum well worth visiting.
After leaving the ship we decided to walk through the old “Greenwich Foot Tunnel”, the pedestrian running under the Thames from Greenwich to Millwall. This tunnel was opened in 1902 and is free to use and it certainly seems busy these days. Fortunately lifts have been installed each end to save walking up/down 100 steps on the Greenwich side (only 87 on the Millwall side), this tunnel is 370-meters long, 15-meters deep with an internal diameter of just under 3-meters. The total tunnel is lined with some 200,000 white glazed tiles. There are notices everywhere telling people NOT to cycle but guess what, they all do, so walking was a little hazardous!!!
On the north side the access comes out into a rather pleasant park and being autumn, the colours and trees looked lovely. After an enjoyable tea and cake, we headed back down the tunnel to get to the pier and get back onto the boat.
On the return boat trip we decided to head to Putney, the end of the line though it was a lot further and slower than we anticipated, with the last few stops to Putney in the dark; still we did have the lights to look at!! On the boat was a party of ladies who got on in Greenwich for the round trip to Putney and they were very entertaining, especially one who was “moaning” in a lighthearted way continually, in fact one of their party bought a packet of Rowntree,s fruit pastels hoping this would “shut-her-up”; fortunately they didn’t work and our entertainment continued.
We eventually got off the boat at the “Embankment pier”, apparently they don’t use theWestminster pier after dark: why??? No problem, just an extra stop on the underground.
Back at Andrew’s where Christine produced dinner for the two of us, the others had already eaten.
After a very enjoyable touristy day, we were ready for bed, we’re not used to all this walking on paved streets etc!!