Glasgow’s City Chambers, the headquarters of Glasgow City Council, is an imposing building that was completed from 1888. There are (pre-COVID) free public tours twice a day Monday to Friday with tickets handed out on a first come first served basis. I got there about half an hour before the start time and was first in a group of about eight people.
I went on a tour of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine as part of Open House London. This was one of my I’m in the area so let’s see what it’s about picks and it turned out to be very interesting. The School was founded in 1899 and based elsewhere but their present home dates from 1926, officially opened in 1929.
Guildhall is one of the buildings that I visited during Open House London; it wasn’t originally on my itinerary but when I found myself in the area I decided to have a look around and was very glad I did because it was definitely one of the highlights of the weekend. It’s a Grade I listed building that was built between 1411 and 1440 and is the ceremonial and administrative centre of the City of London and its corporation.
Lincoln is only an hour or so away from Nottingham so I decided to take a trip there recently and bought a joint ticket to both the Cathedral and Lincoln Castle which was well worth the price of £18. An easy-ish walk from the railway station (there is a steep hill involved though buses are also available) some of the Cathedral was under scaffolding when I visited but that didn’t detract from the impressiveness of the building.
Highgate Cemetery had been on my list of places to visit for a long time and I finally managed to do so on a surprisingly warm and sunny weekend in January. The cemetery is split into two sites across the road from each other – Highgate Cemetery East will feature in my next post. The West Cemetery is accessed by guided tour only and costs £12 (which includes access to the East Cemetery which is self-guided). You can’t book in advance on a weekend but you must do so during the week – I had no problem getting on to a tour on the Sunday at 11am (tours start at 10.30).
As part of Nottingham Light Night 2019 the Lace Market Theatre was offering behind the scenes tours and as this is a local theatre that I keep meaning to visit but haven’t got around to (I promise I’ll go see something there this year!) we thought it would be a nice change of pace to the normal Light Night activities.
I visited the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors‘ headquarters in Great George Street as part of Open House London. It’s the only surviving Victorian building on the street and was designed by Alfred Waterhouse in 1899, who also designed one of my favourite buildings in Nottingham, the Prudential building and the Natural History Museum in London (which will feature in a later post).
You can’t really go to Amsterdam without taking a cruise along the canals and I picked the 100 Highlights Cruise as it was included in the I amsterdam card and would allow me to see parts of the city I wouldn’t be visiting on this trip.
In conjunction with the Deep Mine Tour we went on the Quarry Explorer Tour which was really an unforgettable experience. Strapped into a 4 x 4 military truck you are driven up the slate mountains to the very top of the man-made heights reaching 1400ft above sea level.
The Malt Cross in Nottingham city centre has been on my list of places to visit for a while and finally one day in early December (!) a friend and I went on one of their regular heritage tours. Built in 1877 it is one of only a few Victorian Music Halls still standing.
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