I like walking, my knees however have different ideas but on my recent visit to the city I love I made myself go out each day to wander the streets of London.

Day One

I arrived at my hotel located right next to the London Eye, about 9-9.30am on my first day in London. Because I couldn’t check in for a few hours I left my bags there and decided to wander down South Bank.

It was an area I hadn’t really explored before – I had been to the London Eye and The Globe but other than that I hadn’t spent much time there at all. It was a cold day so the first thing I did was pop into EAT at South Bank for a bacon roll & a hot chocolate (oh and free WiFi!).

I took my time walking down South Bank, stopping to take photos. I come across the South Bank skate park and its graffiti covered walls. I went in behind the OXO tower. Took a photo of St Paul’s – probably one of my favourite photos from the trip. Walked a bit further and found the mural of Shakespeare that I had seen on social media and had wanted to visit. I even randomly found the Golden Hinde, a replica of the ship that Sir Francis Drake used to circumnavigate the globe between 1577-80 – it was tiny!

I stopped for a respite from the cold at Southwark Cathedral, another place I had wanted to go for a long time, before accidentally finding the Borough Markets (I hadn’t realised they were where they were!) then I jumped on a the Tube back to Waterloo Station for the short walk back to my hotel.

Day Two – Morning

I decided to head to Roupell Street, behind Waterloo Station. Roupell Street is famed for having a large collection of intact 19th century workers cottages. Walking down this street is really like stepping back in time (despite the cars parked on the road), especially as it was a grey overcast day and there were not many people around.

From there I walked back past Waterloo Station to Leake Street, which is home to the Leake Street Tunnel – or the Graffiti Tunnel. Now I like street art but I am not a fan of haphazard graffiti and while the tunnel, which is completely covered in graffiti, was kind of impressive, it didn’t really appeal to me.

Because of the cold and the effect it had on my knees I went back to the hotel for a few hours before heading back out that night for some night photos.

Day Two – Evening

Yes, technically I had already walked down South Bank but what I wanted to do is try to get some night photos – which didn’t really pan out as I would have liked but you gotta try right?

So I got the ferry from next to the London Eye down to Bankside Pier, right next to Shakespeare’s Globe. Given that it was only early evening, there were few people around and it is an easy stroll down South Bank. I stopped a number of times to either take photos or try my luck at some hyperlapse footage – again, not entirely successful but I tried.

South Bank is pretty at night – not only with the lights of the buildings but they have trees with strings of lights hanging off them and of course the London Eye is lit up – pink for Valentines Day. Even though it was 1.4 miles (just over 2km), the walk took me about an hour & half to do because of all the stopping I did.

Best shot of the night? And it was from my phone…

Day Three

This was the day I spent walking around Shoreditch – which I have already done a post about here. But I will say that I really did enjoy this area a lot more than I thought I would.

Day Four

This was my last day in London and it was cold. Really cold! I should have jumped on the ferry to Greenwich and I totally regret not doing that now but instead I did something I had, again, wanted to do for a while and go get a specific photo.

It was not far from my hotel – less than a 5 minute walk but like I said, it was really cold that day so I went > came across a photoshoot > hung around to get my photo > got some lunch > went back to the hotel for the rest of the day. And yeah, I totally regret not doing more!

Here are some more of my favourite shots from my time in London: