We wake up to cheering crowds outside our patio. I peer around outside but I can't figure out what is going on or why everyone keeps cheering. Maybe it's because today is our "Dr. Who Day"!!!
As I mentioned in my last blog post, I had originally tried to book two spots for BritMovieTours' Dr. Who Walking Tour of London, which I had been eyeing several months before we ever set a date to go to London. Sadly, it seems I have waited too long to register, because Thursday's tour is now full, and we will be leaving too early on Sunday to take Sunday's tour. So, with the help of www.doctorwholocations.net, and my own TV trivia memory, I have picked out a couple dozen places where Dr. Who has filmed over the years, and combined it with The London Toolkit's walking tours of the city. It's going to be a great way to see the more--and less--famous landmarks of London.
The natural place to start is the TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimension in Space), which is cleverly disguised as a blue police box, ca. 1960s. However, the Tardis is parked outside Earl's Court station, 8km away from our hotel. This is a long start to our randonnée, which will probably limit how many other spots we can visit. We decide to take the metro to the TARDIS, then walk back through Kensington and Buckingham palaces to the Thames River, where we can hit several more locations before returning to the hotel. A total route of about 17km, with plenty of greenspace.
For breakfast, I munch on a croissant we bought late last night at the Waitrose. It's stale and terrible. It might be because we are now used to French croissants from France and nothing else will do... it could be because any croissant still on the store shelf at 10pm is going to be stale.
I put on my Dr. Who t-shirt and we rush out the door towards the Barbican metro station, which is only about 1.5 km away. When we are about half way to the station, Colin realizes that despite all our careful offline mapping, we neglected to figure out how to get from Barbican station to Earl's Court station. Fortunately, there is a Free Wi-Fi box right here, on the sidewalk, so Colin stands there route planning our metro trip. This might be a good time to emphasize that beyond this point, we did this whole randonnée without any cellular or wifi connection, just a list of location names and an offline map, so you can suitably impressed with how many photos I took that actually match up with Dr. Who episodes. ;)
We get off at Earl's Court station. At the newsstand stand directly outside the station, I buy an ultra-British post card for my friend Sun Nee. This stand even sells international stamps! I'm pretty pleased. This will be a lot easier than in France, where stamps never seem to be sold alongside the postcards, and the post offices often seem to be closed. I put the stamp onto the postcard. Then I realize I didn't bring a pen with me, so I will have to wait to write on the post card until I get back to the hotel later today.
The TARDIS is right next to the newsstand, so we take a few playful photos. (Sun Nee, you can see your postcard fourth down on the left side--enjoy!) It's only later, looking at our photos, I realize we missed a great potential photo of me standing directly in front of the TARDIS, just like the 10th Doctor on my shirt... it could have provided a neat optical effect.
With The Doctor evidently away at the moment, the TARDIS door is locked. We really want to see the interior, so Colin tries unlocking it with our sonic screwdriver. Inside is a sink and a first aid kit... I guess it has its perception filter activated so we can't see how big it truly is on the inside! ;)
Our second Dr. Who location is The Commonwealth Institute on Melbury Court, so we walk along Earl's Court Road in the direction of Holland Park. It feels really busy with pedestrians and cars. On the way, we pass St. Philip's church, and come face to face with the Southern end of the park.
The Commonwealth Institute building still exists, even though its namesake charity headquarters has moved to New Zealand. Unfortunately though, it's currently in the middle of a renovation, in preparation for becoming the new location of the Design Museum. Due to all the construction, we cannot gain access. Not an auspicious start to our tour. A sign posted by the gate inquires: "How does this affect you?" If only there were some device that could remove the violent impulses from my brain... ;) We walk around the block to see if there is another way in. There is not.
Somewhat discouraged, we continue onward towards Holland Park along Melbury Road to Ilchester Place, and pass the impressive former home of the painter William Holman Hunt, which also housed Cetshwayo, the last King of the Zulus, in 1882. It has nothing to do with Dr. Who, but is interesting nonetheless.
Just for fun, we enter Holland Park at Ilchester Place, and tour through the rose gardens, where it appears a photo shoot is taking place. The gardens are lovely, and murals display images of what I can only assume is the proper attire for guests to the gardens. We are certainly not properly attired. ;) We head back to the gate at Earl's Court Road, towards our next location: Cornwall Gardens. Cornwell Gardens was also featured in "The Mind of Evil." The path out is filled with people walking their dogs. This would be a great spot for daily dog walks... Colin and I are enjoying this greenspace immensely.
Googlemaps gave us a rather convoluted route to get to Cornwell Gardens. We have no way of knowing in advance that it relies on us getting through a gate which happens to be locked, then through some alleyways that appear blocked. We end up wandering around in curving dead end sstreets before giving up and walking all the way down to Highway A4 then up Grenville Place.
I am excited to find Cornwall Gardens... not so excited to see that they are locked and marked private entry only. I try the sonic screwdriver on the gate lock, but it must be deadlocked, because it won't open. (Why do we only have the 10th Doctor's sonic screwdriver, and not the 11th Doctor's, which can open deadlocks?!) Leaving the gardens, a truck's signage echoes my thoughts: "What a load of rubbish!"
(Thanks again to www.doctorwholocations.net who provided all these amazing screenshots and filming locations. The only reason I am re-posting some of their screenshots here is to compare my photos to the TV locations and to give them props for collecting them. I'm hoping this will encourage others to visit their website and design their own self-guided walking tours. www.doctorwholocations.net has all the below screenshots plus so much more incredible information about each location and episode--Please go visit their amazing website!!)
Walking up Glouchester Road towards Kensington Gardens, we are realizing how tired we are, so we get another macchiato at Fait Maison. We enter the park at Palace Gate, and I am immediately enthralled with the dog water fountain. There is also a directional signpost which, while not yellow, still reminds me of my randonnées in rural France.
Rather than taking the Broad Walk, which would lead us directly to Kensington Palace, we decide to take a smaller path through the trees and arrive at the King William III statue on the South side of the Palace. From there, we walk around to the Main Gate. Seeing a vacant bench right outside the palace, we decide this is the perfect place for our picnic lunch.
While there are no Dr. Who filming locations on the Palace grounds, there is supposed to be a TARDIS. We don't see the promised TARDIS, but I can't seem to confirm that it was ever actually installed to date. We still do the Wiggley Walk and view the Sunken Gardens before continuing along the Broad Walk towards our next Dr. Who location: Bayswater Road near Black Lion's Gate.
Beside Broad Walk is where Dr. Who frolicked in the fields, so I give it a go. Then I simply must pose in front of "Time Flies," beside The Diana Memorial Playground. One interesting thing about Diana's Playground is that all adults must be accompanied by a child! So I could only take this one photo from outside the gate. Looks pretty fun!! Um, for kids of course...
After visiting the North side of the park, we head across to the South side, for some more Dr. Who locations. On the way, we decide to circle around the Round Pond, which is home to many beautiful birds, including--to our surprise--Canada Geese!
Back on the South side of the park, we walk through beautiful woodlands before getting a tantilizing glimpse of the Albert Memorial and the Royal Albert Hall.
The Albert Memorial is quite elaborate. The statue of Albert himself is gold, and gold adorns the canopy. There is a bas relief wrapping around all four sides of the Memorial depicting nearly 200 artists and musicians. Each corner features two sets of statues. The groups closest to the centre represent different industries: agriculture, commerce, engineering, and manufacturing.
The statues in the outer ring represent different continents: Europe, Asia, Africa, and America. Europe has a bull, Asia a camel, Africa an elephant, and America a buffalo. All of them appear to be 100% Caucasian, except one East Asian-looking guy thrown in the mix. It's especially awesome how First Nations are portrayed wearing Greek toga-like clothing... but with feather headdresses. Did I say awesome? ... I meant to say Eurocentric. Maybe the point is not to represent the original peoples of those continents, but rather the British conquest of them?? I guess the Daleks would enjoy that theme... This monument was featured in "The Dalek Invasion of Earth," another one of the 1st Doctor's adventures.
The same episode featured the The Royal Albert Hall, which is right across the street. Here, Colin mugs it up for the camera, feigning fear of all the Daleks at the Hall.
Next, we wander East through the park to the Serpentine Gallery and its very odd Serpentine Pavillion competition winner. While not a Dr. Who site, this is certainly something that could be a useful backdrop for some kind of SciFi... ;) Inside, there is a a café. Because Britain.
Close to the Long Water is the Princess Diana memorial Fountain. Its gently rushing waters are really popular on this warm summer day. While Colin rests in the shade, I take off my shoes and walk the full loop of the fountain. Every 10-20 feet, the fountain changes... one part has little bubbles that tickle the bottom of my feet, another has an undulating waterfall in levels, some parts are shallow and even, other parts are knee-deep pools. Kids and adults alike are walking around like me, or just sitting and soaking their feet. One guard keeps an eye over the steepest waterfall and deepest pool.
We continue East through Hyde Park. The Long Water is packed with boats and birds. A couple dozen seniors are snacking on dainty appetizers on the solar-powered Solar Shuttle boat next to the Isis statue and her Fibonacci spirals. Balloons and giggly teens tell me that several of the paddleboats are celebrating someone's Sweet 16. Our next Dr. Who destinations are Buckingham Palace and the Mall, but we get an unexpected bonus when we spot the BT Tower peeking out over the trees. We're on a 1st Doctor roll, as the top of the BT Tower was taken over by WOTAN on his watch, the super-computer that created the 1966 episode's titular "War Machines." Plus, you know, it looks like a sonic screwdriver! Don't tell me I'm the only one who has thought this!!
At the end of the water, we walk along Rotten Row a little. We do see a pair of equestrians, but I'm not sure how upper-class they are, since we smell them coming quite a while before they come into view. The horses, that is, not the actual equestrians. Nearing the end of Hyde Park, we glimpse the lovely Artemis Fountain surrounded by rose bushes, but hightail it out of there before she catches us and turns us into stags.
On the very tail end of Hyde Park, we pass through the arches beside Apsley House, then through the Wellington Arch. I love its crowning statue of the Angel of Peace dropping down onto the four-horse War Chariot. We consider climbing up, but decide against it. We've got more Dr. Who locations to discover!! ;)
We are enjoying all the greenspace on this walk, so rather than take the more direct route to Buckingham Palace along Constitution Hill, we detour slightly through Green Park. We take the little path to the left in the photo below, and head right into the centre of the park before turning right. Colin wants to see the Canada Memorial and the Canada Gate (because Canada!), so we approach Buckingham Palace from that side. Yep--it's a gate alright... well, more of a fence, since we can't actually enter through it.
At Buckingham Palace, we hop up on a short wall to take a photo of the palace from the Canada Gate, and soon over a half dozen other people hop up too. I mug fear over the Titanic nearly crashing into the roof of the palace, as it did in 2007's "Voyage of the Damned" with the 10th Doctor. This story gave me my all-time favorite scene of the series... "Whot?!?! WHOT!?!?!"
Fun fact provided by the wonderful www.doctorwholocations.net: "The scene of the Queen outside the Palace waving to the Doctor as the Titanic sweeps overhead was actually filmed at National Museum of Wales!" Too bad. Today, the Queen doesn't come out and wave to me either. Nor do I see Churchill returning to the senate on his mammoth, as he did in 2011's "The Wedding of River Song" with the 11th Doctor. At The Mall, I consider pretending to run the Olympic Torch up towards the Palace, just like in 2006's "Fear Her" with the 10th Doctor, but then think better of it. Maybe it's all the traffic hurtling at me... I don't know.
Rather than walk down the length of The Mall to our next set of Dr. Who locations, we stick to the greenspace route through James Park. At the first opportunity, we go straight to the lake's edge, where many birds are happy to pose for me, like this Grey Heron and this pair of Coots.
Although the trees are providing some shade, at this point we've already walked at least 10km in the sun, and I talk Colin into buying us nice cold ice cream cones from a truck in the park. A goose seems very sure Colin will share with him. It's extra funny because it's the same posture my dog Rory gets when he feels he deserves some of my food. Some things cross all species boundaries. lol.
Here, as in every park since Kensington Gardens, we have seen people in green striped lawn chairs, willing to pay £1.60 per hour for the pleasure. I can't understand it. Free park benches seem plentiful, and the grass is nice too. Near the end of the lake is a beautiful fountain.
At the end of St James Park is the Guard's Memorial, and we are face to face with the square on Horse Guard's Road.
Colin takes a great PANO of the square (click photo below for full size). The Horse Guard's Road was featured in 2012's "The Bells of Saint John" with the 11th Doctor. The Doctor and Clara had to make a quick getaway on a motorbike.
We walk through the center of the Horse Guard building and are treated with an interesting sight: a traditional guard in full traditional dress with his sword, next to a modern policeman equipped with a semi-automatic rifle and a Glock. I don't know if this is normal here, or a response to the recent ISIS call to terror, which has included attacks on Brits, and an attack near Lyon while we were there in June.
We can't tarry here, as have several Dr. Who locations to visit in this area. We decide to first turn left and see Admiralty Arch on the NorthEast end of the Mall, To get there, we pass the Admiralty buildings first, and I take this neat photo through an arch. Admiralty Arch was featured in 1968's "Web of Fear" with the 2nd Doctor. Sorry no Dr. Who scene available for comparison, since this is another episode whose film was lost until 2013, when it was found in Nigeria!!! (A twist worthy of Dr. Who, to be sure).
Admiralty Arch links the Mall to Trafalgar Square, which is our next stop. As we approach, we see several emergency vehicles pulling up to the square. Uh oh. We are always on edge now for possible terror attacks. But nothing major seems to be happening, so we continue in to the square. I manage to capture photos of many major scenes from "The Dalek Invasion of Earth" and "The Chase" (see above), as well as 1969's "Seeds of Death" with the 2nd Doctor and 2005's "Rose" with the 9th Doctor. Just like The Doctor and Barbara, people can't seem to resist playing with the lions.
As we get closer to The National Gallery, at the far end of the square, we see some very usual time travellers! A female Na'vi from Avatar, a silver man from I-have-no-idea-what, and a floating Yoda who beacons me over. I hesitate, which he is not impressed with. The piles of vomit here give us a hint to why the ambulances might have been called in, and indeed we see a paramedic wandering around the area.
We circle back along the West side of the square, see more vomit, and assume the sickly victim must have also exited the square in this direction. While we are punished with the sights and smells of vomit, we are rewarded with Canada House. ("Rewarded?" Yes! because Canada!!)
We retrace our steps down Whitehall to get to our next Dr. Who location: 10 Downing Street! There is a big crowd outside, and we can see that we can't actually enter past the gates, so I just snap a photo from across the street. There have been several great Dr. Who scenes set at 10 Downing Street over the decades. Some of the most memorable being when an evil/insane Time Lord self-titled The Master murders a David Cameron-like PM and his cabinet (as well as the American President) to take over the world in "The Sound of Drums" and "Last of the Time Lords."
On our side of the street, in front of the Ministry of Defense, there is a large makeshift shrine with flowers and handwritten notes about Gaza, and very colorful protest against US involvement in Eritrea. For a moment I get excited about seeing a TARDIS parked behind the fence (see centre of photo below), but then realize it's not quite right... probably some kind of parking toll booth. Can't blame a girl for hoping... this kind of socio-political unrest is just what might attract the Doctor. ;)
Continuing down Whitehall, we reach the Cenotaph, where London is shown as being deserted in 1973's "Invasion of the Dinosaurs" and the 9th Doctor and Rose listen to MP Harriet Jones speak in 2004 "World War Three."
Of course, now we have to see the rest of Harriet Jones' speech locations and why she's always speechifying, so we head towards the Parliament Buildings. On the way, we pass the HM Treasury and the Foreign and Commonwealth Offices.
Just past this are the Parliament Buildings and the iconic Big Ben. In 2005's "Aliens of London," a spaceship crashes into London and takes a chunk out of Big Ben. Harriet Jones is introduced as a plucky MP who does her best to help the 9th Doctor. She continues to work tirelessly to protect London against aliens again in the next episode, "World War Three," and she actually becomes the Prime Minister herself! In a later episode, "The Christmas Invasion," the 10th Doctor doesn't seem to like her as much as the 9th, and ended her career with six little words, "Don't you think she looks tired?" Ah, politics...
As we step onto the bridge, we can see the Royal Airforce Memorial on the close bank of the river to our left and the London Eye on the opposite shore. In the 2004 episode, "Rose," the titular Rose spies the Police Box parked at the Airforce Memorial (far left of photo below), and argues with the 9th Doctor over the morality of the "death" of her newly plastic boyfriend, before having an epiphany and running over the bridge to The London Eye. (I also included here a photo of the memorial and the Ministry of Defense buildings taken from The Eye, so you can see it better.)
DOCTOR: But first I've got to find it. How can you hide something that big
in a city this small?
ROSE: Hold on. Hide what?
DOCTOR: The transmitter. The Consciousness is controlling
every single piece of plastic, so it needs a transmitter to boost the signal.
ROSE: What's it look like? DOCTOR: Like a transmitter. Round and massive, slap bang in the middle
of London. A huge circular metal structure like a dish, like a wheel. Radial.
Close to where we're standing. Must be completely invisible. What? What?
(The Doctor turns and looks at what Rose is staring at on the south bank but the penny doesn't drop.) DOCTOR: What? What is it? What?
(He finally catches on to what Rose is looking at: the London Eye, on the south bank of the Thames...
the biggest Wheel in the world.)
DOCTOR: Oh. Fantastic!
This is the same location where authorities dock their boat to reveal materials they recovered from the aforementioned spaceship they were chasing down Whitehall (spoiler alert: it crashes into the Thames).
Close to the other side of Westminster Bridge, I see a girl in a Dr. Who toque, and we give each other the thumbs up. Even though it's only 18 degrees Celsius, and not the sweltering 35 we are used to in Chamelet, I still can't imagine wearing a toque in this weather. Maybe she's Canadian (thanks Urban Dictionary, your parody genius has consistently given me a good laugh).
As we get to the other side of the bridge, I spend way too long locating the fish form "The Chase." Maybe I'm short on macchiato. Eventually, we do find it, because they are all along the seawall. Due to the position of the fish above the seawall, it is more difficult than I imagined to duplicate the Dr. Who scene, but we do all right. Colin gets closer due to his greater upper body strength. My guess is, Ian pulled himself up using that hand we can see in the shot. I didn't think of that at the time. I did think of climbing up and kneeling on the wall, but decided against it... swimming in the Thames carries a higher penalty than just getting wet.
Of course, by that I mean Daleks, and not getting nicked by the bobbies. lol. Daleks were all over the bridge and surrounding areas in both "The Chase" and "The Dalek Invasion of Earth."
The Thames rushes past, oblivious to my Dr. Who escapade. However, on other occasions, the river itself was the location of several significant moments, including the aforementioned alien craft crash (in "Aliens of London/World War Three"), as well as being completely drained by the 10th Doctor in "Runaway Bride," in an attempt to stop the Racnoss from repopulating the universe. (BTW the start of this story gives us another great "Whot?!" scene.) Although, to be honest, all of those draining-the-Thames scenes were filmed near the Thames Barrier, which we didn't get to on this trip. Actually... I DID manage to snap a couple photos of it from the airplane in May... does that count? I think it counts!
After communing with the fish, checking for Daleks, and peering down the steps, we walk along Queen's Walk to the London Eye. While we do see a busker, closer inspection reveals that it is not the 11th Doctor nor Clara. There are, however, some people with funny-looking hats...
We check out The Eye and ponder whether to ride it. Betty had recommended it as the highlight of her London trip in June. Behind The Eye, we notice The Dungeon, a Disneyland-type amusement ride where they bring Jack the Ripper to life as you walk through various rooms, and at some point the floor drops down under your feet. You can get a deal by doing both the Dungeon and The Eye (£45 per person), but when we convert the amount into Canadian dollars ($90 each!!) we just can't handle paying it. We settle for wandering around in Jubilee Gardens and Belvedere Road. County Hall is quite busy. Maybe it's the statue of the nude woman quite graphically giving birth carved into the facade... am I the only one who noticed this??
After so many Dr. Who locations, we decide it's time for a rest. We head over the Golden Jubilee Bridge, towards another pub on my list: The Harp.
Approaching William IV Street, we see a pair of ambulances, and again pause to worry about possible terror attacks. When nothing major appears to be happening, we walk between them to get to The Harp Pub. As with the Old Red Cow Pub yesterday, the drinking crowd is spilled out into the street. However, unlike yesterday, the inside of the pub is also quite full. Although we thoroughly enjoyed standing in they alley with the locals yesterday, after about 15 km walking on concrete today, we are happy to get off our feet for a bit.
We order two pints (a Dark Star Hophead and a Harveys Sussex Best Bitter), and wander through the pub, trying to find a seat. We head up the extremely narrow staircase to the upper floor, where the pub atmosphere gives way to a sitting room, complete with fireplace and leather loungers. An older couple sitting by the window graciously help make some room for us. The woman is a dead-ringer for Livia Kohn, who has been a continual source of inspiration to me as our paths have crossed many times over the last decade. Since we are sitting so close together, I can't help but overhear the woman having quite an intellectual conversation with her companion, and then mention travelling to China soon! Between this and they physical resemblance, plus the wardrobe, I start to wonder if Livia has indeed been cloned. ;) (Too confusing? I bet THIS might clear things up more than THIS. Whot?!?!)
Rested, our feet now hurt more than ever. We've still got 3km to go to get back to the hotel. We head down Strand/A4. My former incarnation as a Vaudeville performer must have kicked in, because I automatically captured photos of the three remaining theatres in this Victorian-era theatre hub: the Adelphi Theatre, the Vaudeville Theatre, and the Savoy Theatre. The Adelphi is playing Kinky Boots, one of my favorites!
I also a photo of this neat set of buildings along the Strand. Little do I know their importance and relationship to King's College, about 500m down the road. Perhaps my eye for significant buildings lends some credence to the theory that they should indeed be preserved?
I'm attracted by the faces on the arches of Sommerset House, whose East wing is part of King's College. For some reason, I don't take any photos of the rest of King's College.
In a traffic island across from Sommerset House is St Mary le Strand church, one of two "island churches" along the Strand. This is the church of the Women's Royal Naval Service. Thefirst St Mary le Strand church was close to this spot since at least since 1222. In the 16th Century, that church was torn down to build Sommerset House. The current church dates to the 18th Century.
On the other side of the traffic circle is the Bush House, the longtime former home of the BBC, which produced Dr. Who since its conception in 1963. In 2012 BBC had to move out and find new digs.
On the other end of the King's College campus is the other of the two "island churches": St Clement Danes church, the central church for the British Royal Air Force (RAF). There has been a church on this site since the 9th Century. The statue here is of late 19th century Prime Minister Gladstone. Behind him, hidden in the greenery, are statues of RAF leaders Arthur "Bomber" Harris and Hugh Dowding.
Where Strand turns into Fleet Street, A4 veers off to the left and we follow it North. We pass the lovely Neo-Gothic Maughan Library, which is a part of King's College Strand campus. It has a crypt that reminds me of the crypt where The Evil Queen keeps her collection of hearts.
At the hotel, I unpack our bag and realize I've somehow lost Sun Nee's post card at some point. Some lucky tourist is getting a postage-paid surprise. Meanwhile, Colin finally notices the photo collage on the wall and is afraid of its "weeping angel" style picture. He keeps one eye on the image while we make pasta and watch Dr. Who on his laptop (including 2008's "The Sontaran Strategem" which contains many London landmarks). If I were the pranking type... ;) Luckily for Colin, I'm happy to just watch Dr. Who on TV. It's a perfect ending to a great day.
Before I sign off this post, I want to give another big heartfelt thank you to www.doctorwholocations.net, as well as www.dailymail.co.uk and www.theguardian.com for all their hard work collecting Dr. Who filming locations, images, and info. They did not sponsor this trip or blog, but I could not have done this trip without them!
Information, downloads, photographs and other media are provided for reference and for personal use only (planning visits etc.).
All screen captures are the copyright of the BBC and appear here as reference to illustrate the location in comparison with how it looked at the time of filming and the present day; no attempt is made to supercede this or any other copyright.
This is some amazing Self guided walking tour of London details, I will keep all these things in my mind when taking a trip to UK next year.
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