Great Fire of London

31 October 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, London Reading Time:  29 minutes

Monument to the Great Fire of London and Pudding Lane © flickr.com - It's No Game/cc-by-2.0

Monument to the Great Fire of London and Pudding Lane © flickr.com – It’s No Game/cc-by-2.0

The Great Fire of London was a major conflagration that swept through central London from Sunday 2 September to Thursday 6 September 1666, gutting the medieval City of London inside the old Roman city wall, while also extending past the wall to the west. The death toll is generally thought to have been relatively small, although some historians have challenged this belief.   read more…

Embassy of the United States in London

3 October 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, London Reading Time:  7 minutes

© Curran2/cc-by-sa-4.0

© Curran2/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Embassy of the United States of America in London is the diplomatic mission of the United States in the United Kingdom. It is located in Nine Elms and is the largest American embassy in Western Europe and the focal point for events relating to the United States held in the United Kingdom. From an architectural point of view, the embassy is interesting because, among other things, aspects of medieval castle building came into play here, including a moat. Ground was broken on 13 November 2013, and the building opened to the public on 13 December 2017.   read more…

Lambeth Palace in London

1 October 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, House of the Month, London Reading Time:  10 minutes

Lambeth Palace from the herb garden © geograph.org.uk - Marathon/cc-by-sa-2.0

Lambeth Palace from the herb garden © geograph.org.uk – Marathon/cc-by-sa-2.0

Lambeth Palace is the official London residence of the archbishop of Canterbury. It is situated in north Lambeth, London, on the south bank of the River Thames, 400 yards (370 metres) south-east of the Palace of Westminster, which houses Parliament, on the opposite bank.   read more…

Portrait: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a British writer and physician

27 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Portrait Reading Time:  6 minutes

Arthur Conan Doyle by Walter Benington, 1914 © RR Auction

Arthur Conan Doyle by Walter Benington, 1914 © RR Auction

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle KStJ, DL was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for A Study in Scarlet, the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Holmes and Dr. Watson. The Sherlock Holmes stories are milestones in the field of crime fiction.   read more…

Windsor Castle

18 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks Reading Time:  7 minutes

© Diliff/cc-by-2.5

© Diliff/cc-by-2.5

Windsor Castle is a royal residence at Windsor in the English county of Berkshire. It is strongly associated with the English and succeeding British royal family, and embodies almost a millennium of architectural history.   read more…

Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire

10 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  4 minutes

Former town hall, today the Roman Catholic Church of St Thomas More © geograph.org.uk - Humphrey Bolton/cc-by-sa-2.0

Former town hall, today the Roman Catholic Church of St Thomas More
© geograph.org.uk – Humphrey Bolton/cc-by-sa-2.0

Bradford-on-Avon (sometimes Bradford on Avon or Bradford upon Avon) is a town and civil parish in west Wiltshire, England, near the border with Somerset, which had a population of 10,405 at the 2021 census. The town’s canal, historic buildings, shops, pubs and restaurants make it popular with tourists.   read more…

Stirling in Scotland

5 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  9 minutes

© flickr.com - Stirling Council - John McPake/cc-by-2.0

© flickr.com – Stirling Council – John McPake/cc-by-2.0

Stirling (Scots: Stirlin; Scottish Gaelic: Sruighlea) is a city in central Scotland, 26 miles (42 km) northeast of Glasgow and 37 miles (60 km) north-west of Edinburgh. The market town, surrounded by rich farmland, grew up connecting the royal citadel, the medieval old town with its merchants and tradesmen, the Old Bridge and the port. Located on the River Forth, Stirling is the administrative centre for the Stirling council area, and is traditionally the county town of Stirlingshire. Proverbially it is the strategically important “Gateway to the Highlands”.   read more…

University of Manchester

2 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Universities, Colleges, Academies Reading Time:  7 minutes

Whitworth Hall © Michael D Beckwith

Whitworth Hall © Michael D Beckwith

The University of Manchester is a public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester City Centre on Oxford Road. The university owns and operates major cultural assets such as the Manchester Museum, The Whitworth art gallery, the John Rylands Library, the Tabley House Collection and the Jodrell Bank Observatory – a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The University of Manchester is considered a red brick university, a product of the civic university movement of the late 19th century. The current University of Manchester was formed in 2004 following the merger of the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST) and the Victoria University of Manchester. This followed a century of the two institutions working closely with one another.   read more…

The Spirit of Adventure

1 September 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Cruise Ships, Yacht of the Month Reading Time:  7 minutes

in Cadiz © flickr.com - A Guy Named Nyal/cc-by-sa-2.0

in Cadiz © flickr.com – A Guy Named Nyal/cc-by-sa-2.0

Spirit of Adventure is a cruise ship operated by Saga Cruises and constructed by Meyer Werft in Papenburg, Germany. As Saga’s second new-build vessel, she was originally considered as an option in the cruise line’s pursuit to renew its fleet, but the company finalised the order in 2017 after seeing rising profits in its travel business following the announcement of her sister ship, Spirit of Discovery. Her keel was laid on 3 June 2019 and she was delivered on 29 September 2020, but in response to travel restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the inaugural cruise was continuously postponed until she officially debuted on 26 July 2021.   read more…

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