Does anyone have a pedometer?

After we left the office today, we decided to go to St Paul’s Cathedral. An ex-colleague/work friend of mine strongly suggested visiting St Paul’s Cathedral as it was the most beautiful place she’s ever seen.

I was already tired as I’ve been walking around with my laptop and no matter how far technology advances and make electronic devices smaller, there will always be new technology to be squeezed into computers and the weight of laptops pretty much remain the same.

We took the tube to get to St Paul’s (around 3-4 stops plus one change) and the cathedral grounds is pretty much directly behind the tube exit. Walking to the right hand side I saw the “Temple Bar”.

The Temple Bar is the only surviving gateway into the City of London. It was erected by King Charles II to replace a previous timber structure. Where it stands now is actually not its original location. It was moved there as it was blocking traffic.

Directly opposite the Temple Bar is the right side of the cathedral where you’ll see the dome.

We’re not allowed to take photos inside but the ceiling of the cathedral, including the dome, is covered in beautiful paintings and art work. There are no words that good describe it except….PHWAOR!

The structure standing today is actually the fifth church on this site and was designed by Sir Christopher Wren to replace the previous Gothic cathedral destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. Anyway, originally a spire on the old church, the dome consists of a bigger dome covering a smaller dome. Wren designed it this way to make it look impressive from the inside as well as the outside. People can actually go up the dome (434 steps in total). The first stop is the “Whispering Gallery”, after 163 steps. Somewhere in the middle of the dome structure you’ll see a fence-like structure. This is the “Stone Gallery” and that is 282 steps up. Above the grey part of the dome is the “Golden Gallery” and that is 434 steps up. Really cool…inside the walls of the cathedral are tunnels and stairs and this is how you get to the top. In between stair cases sometimes there are resting seats. The tunnels are very tight. With my laptop bag, I had to walk slightly sideways in some parts.

Once you get to the Stone Gallery, you get breath-taking views (if you have any left that is) of the city like the ones below showing the Millennium Bridge and London Eye.




The steps are spiral and are very tightly wound. You can never plant your feet flat and have to tip toe all the way up. When you reach the Golden Gallery, guess what we saw…

Hahaha! Anyway I think they meant no jumping…..

If you think that’s it, you are very wrong. We went in the afternoon. Got there around 3pm and got to the Golden Gallery around 3.50pm. We were rushing back down because another part of the cathedral is “The Crypt”, the cathedral’s burial chamber and it closes 4pm. We didn’t make it in time but we did see the tomb’s of Lord Nelson and Florence Nightingale. So the rest of the cathedral will be part 2 then…10 quid to enter to I’ll have to work to get some money first.