Scenic Saturday - London

Number 13 in the series.

It was Samuel Johnson who said to Boswell back in 1777, "Why, Sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford."

That is my problem this week: not what to say about London, but what not to say. As far as scenic Britain is concerned, there is just too much: the River Thames (famously painted by both Turner and Monet), the Houses of Parliament, Trafalgar Square, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, St Paul's Cathedral, the Tower of London - and numerous nooks and crannies far too many to mention.

Just in passing, I should mention that the real London - the City of London - is just one square mile and was surrounded by a wall in Roman times, traces of the wall still there to be seen. True Londoners, born within the sound of Bow bells, are known as Cockneys. And the Bow bells are not the bells in the church at Bow, part of the East End and outside the City. Bow bells are the bells of the church of St Mary-le-Bow in Cheapside.

Two pictures this week (and it could just as easily be 200 or 2,000). First, one of the most famous pictures from the Second World War - the dome of St Paul's Cathedral rising above the flames and smoke as London burned during the blitz. It was this picture as much as anything that gave hope to the hard-pressed citizens.

And now something more up to date - a view from the London Eye showing the Houses of Parliament with St Margaret's church and the much larger Westminster Abbey to the right of the clock tower. (Which reminds me, it is not the tower which is named Big Ben, it is just the bell in the clock.)