Last days of London.. Sherlock,trains and paintings

 

What visit to London would be complete without checking out 221B Baker Street. We visited the Sherlock Holmes museum and although its really “kitschy” it did give us a view into a 1800 London Victorian flat.  They have filed the six room flat as if it was the real home of the fictional Holmes.  Very tiny, cramped but interesting.  It would have been tough being a Victorian and living in these rooms! 

After heading up the stairs
, the first room shown would have been the parlor.. very tiny and cramped with all the accouterments the great detective

Bedroom.. very short beds!

 

 At the top of the stairs!

Remember the hound of the Baskervilles? Well here is his head!

Most of the rooms were dark like the entryway.

Then it was on to the St Pancrans station for a look inside

 A very typical train station. But such beauty outside the building

And of course the statue of farewells!

We stopped here near the Eurostar train to have a cup of tea and a cake. 

The Renaissance Hotel is in the Station. From a distance we spayed a bright neon fuchsia dot in the parking lot….A McClaren!! Delightful amongst the red bricks!! Too bad we couldn’t see who had driven it!

Right next door to the station is the British Library. It is the equivalent to our Library of Congress I think. 

It is open to the public and has a wonderful rare book collection.

Lyrics written by John Lennon on the back of a birthday card for his son.

Drawings by Paul McCartney of George and John i the notebook of an interviewer

Handel’s hand written music the script written for Monty Python for “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

Ive taken lots of pictures of the really rare books and won’t bore you with them. The collection was unbelievable and broken into sections..Art of the book, Shakespeare,music, old texts and Magna Carta

Second copy written in 1225.

First copy of the Magna Carta from 1215

Interesting history happened from the first writing until the second. I suggest you look into it as the story is too long for me to write here.

Im now the proud owner of my very own British Library reading room pass! The cheapest souvenir ever… Now I can come back over the next two years and research anything I want!!!!

Next up we headed to the National Gallery to look at the Impressionist collection of paintings

Such a beautiful building 

Each Gallery was not only filled with art but a work of art itself.

Picasso is always a favorite of mine

 Monet’s picture reminded me of the gardens in La Harve, France where he was born. We strolled through many of those when we were there.

And of course  no impressionist collection is complete without Van Gogh. To actually see Sunflowers was wonderful.

This mosaic was the floor going out of the museum. It had no special covering over it, we just walked over it. Seemed kinda strange to casually walk on something so beautiful.

Outside the museum

The museum square.

From here we again took the tube back to our hotel in Chelsea and got ready for a nice evening dinner nearby and repacked our bags for our move tomorrow to the city of Bath.