A circuit on the London Eye

One of the curious facts of being born in West
London, within the sound of rumbling jets at
Heathrow, is that one is less likely to have “done” the London sights. Correction, one will have done the educational ones ( S. Kensington museums etc. , on school trips ) but probably not the Tower of London. Now why that should be is anyone’s guess. It’s possibly The Mousetrap effect: one knows it will always be there, so can be put off for another day. In the meantime, there are more immediate things to be done, like shopping on Oxford St, or a film or play to be seen etc. I was 45 when I finally looked in on the Crown Jewels, and (though I hate to admit it) at least 30 before seeing Tower Bridge in close-up.

But having watched the London Eye gradually implant itself on the South Bank, and the touch-and-go business of getting it up and running, I was determined to check it out, before something happened to it. I say that as someone who's been to the top of the Telecom Tower as well as Windsor Castle’s Round Tower. Both are now closed off to tourists, thanks to terrorist action, or the threat thereof.

But the queues for the Eye are notorious. Everyone knows that. So here’s my experience, and a tip for the impatient.

It’s one of those queuing systems where you keep having to go back on yourself, wishing you could just duck under the rope, and save yourself half and hour or more. What makes matters worse is having to listen to the almost non-stop recording that says only one member of a party should be in the queue.

As you get closer to the ticket booth, you see illuminated signs that say there’s an express check-in, at a price ! But here’s the rub – it doesn’t tell you where to go, it’s not visible, and one can hardly leave the queue to go searching.

In fact it’s right down at the end of the hall, but I only discovered that later. So that’s the tip. Save yourself an hour or 90 minutes, at least, by opting to be ripped off.

Even when you have bought your ticket, there’s another serpentine queue to join outdoors, but finally the magic moment arrives, as you and 24 others are ushered into a capsule for a memorable 30 minutes of your life.

One’s barely aware of movement, and there’s plenty of time to frame one’s pictures, although reflection off the curved glass diminishes the end result - as you can see below.

But you’ll see all the main sights, and a few more besides if you know where to look. They say


Windsor Castle is visible on a clear day. I was pleased to see the Swiss Re tower (aka the Gherkin), which I had visited earlier that day. That to me is just so amazing. To this blogger it's the second most beautiful building in the world (after the Taj Mahal), and will be the subject of a post next week.

Coming down is a bit of an anticlimax. So I spent some of the time on walkabout round the capsule, with the dinky digital camera in video mode.

Thanks to YouTube, it’s now possible to show you that somewhat jerky footage. Just click on this link LondonEye . You'll get a lot of tourist chatter too, if your speakers are switched on.


Final (off )note: whilst there is much to admire in London, I am not a Londonophile. This is partly because I dislike all large cities, preferring towns and villages.

But it’s also a dislike of the absence of a proper civic feel in London, outside of the Royal Parks (ironic, isn’t it, that we have to thank privileged monarchy for those precious few acres of space and amenity ? ).

Too much of London is noisy, traffic and pedestrian clogged. Too much of the architecture is predominantly Victorian, Empire-era, somewhat fortress like, with too many insertions of brash modern buildings that are out of scale or character.

London is an architectural free-for-all , reflecting certainly its laissez-faire mercantile history, and arguably what Ted Heath once called "the unacceptable face of capitalism".

Contrast London with the gracious layout of so many historic Italian town and cities, with piazzas, fountains, and friendly, inviting squares (without spiked railings or overgrown plane trees). It’s odd how it needed a terrorist bomb to replace the Baltic Exchange (an ugly building if ever there was) with the Swiss Re tower.

Sadly, and ironically, the words of John Betjeman spring to mind – “Come friendly bombs …..”.

Anyway, here's a link if you want to know more about visiting the London Eye.

I'll be blogging on Saturday about the hilltop village of Biot. We were there this morning, Christmas shopping for colourful Provençal glassware - always well received.