Bixa buzzes Blighty

[bixaorellana]

I have always wanted to visit England, and achieved that goal this summer, but only technically. One leg of my journey home from Istanbul took me from Atatürk Airport to Heathrow Airport. Although my feet did not touch any actual English soil, I still got a little souvenir in the form of photos. I started snapping out the airplane window as soon as the cloud cover allowed and kept going until just before landing.

I thought those of you who know that part of England might enjoy naming places and landmarks that can be seen in these pictures. The pictures should be big enough, but if not, you can see the full-sized versions here by opening the photo in question & clicking on it to blow it up.

Happy hunting!

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[bixaorellana]

9.


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16.

[mickthecactus]

11 and 12 Kew Gardens.

[patricklondon]

5. has the Barnes Wetlands Centre and Craven Cottage football ground. You just missed taking a photo of the house where I was brought up.

6 and 7: Hammersmith Bridge, St Paul's School (on the riverside) and in 7 Chiswick Eyot, and right at the bottom left Barnes Railway Bridge and my old school's boathouse where I learnt to row.

8 and 9: Chiswick Bridge and Kew Railway Bridge. Not a lot else of note.

10: Kew railway and road bridges - and Kew Gardens.

13. Syon Park and Syon House

14. Isleworth

15 and 16: miscellaneous bits of Hounslow!



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[mickthecactus]

Good job you're a local Patrick.

[Deleted]

And now Bixa can say that she's seen all of those places...

[mickthecactus]

Looking at the Kew Gardens picture the red brick building at 12 o'clock in front of the river is Kew Palace originally occupied by George III amongst others.

Moving clockwise the horizontal white building at the end of the Great Walk is the Orangery.

Clockwise from that the angular greenhouse is the Princess of Wales Conservatory.

Centre is the Palm House and lake.

Top left before the river is the glasshouse range housing the Living Collection which is not open to the public.

Although the next picture is essentially the same at bottom left you can see the treetop walk.

[mossie]

Interesting. You just must not dismiss parts of Hounslow as uninteresting, I spent several happy months there when I was 17 and working at Heathrow Airport. My first serious girlfriend, a young lady some 6 years my senior, was my deputy shift leader. She arranged the rest shifts when we were on night duty, enough said.

[fumobici]

Really nice airplane window photos! Not easy to get as most of us know. LHR approaches often go right over London and if the weather cooperates, you can often see a good view of the city. I'll just include a photo I took coming into LHR from Seattle.



Forgive the image size, the photo doesn't really compress down very well.

[mickthecactus]

That's a terrific picture.

[Deleted]

That shows just about everything. No need for Bixa to ever go to London in person!

[bixaorellana]

Wow -- you guys really came through!

Sorry about missing your house, Patrick, but thrilled with all the IDs -- thank you! Didn't you cover some of 6 & 7 in a thread once? Also the Barnes Wetland Center? If you can point me in the right direction, I'd like to include links to those in this thread.

Mick, great details. Does this mean you think you don't need to accompany me when I finally get to visit Kew?
Mick's wonderful coverage of Kew can be seen here: anyportinastorm.proboards.com/thread/5217/kew-gardens

Yes, 11 and 12 are very similar, but there is a bridge in 12. There is also a peculiar horseshoe shaped thing bottom left. ~?~

Mossie, I am happy your miscellaneous bits were happy in Hounslow.

Right in the middle of 10 there is a huge, irregularly shaped mowed green space, parts of which can also be seen in the next two pictures. Any idea of what that might be?

Where does the river go in 14 -- underground? Fascinating how that empty land on the right with its mysterious markings is separated by only a tree line from the apartments and businesses on the left, with a little triangle of church & graveyard left from the old days.

Are those allotments & a graveyard in 16?

I believe a major landmark was overlooked in 4. Look at it again in this big version, please: www.flickr.com/photos/17499332@N00/20994802944/in/album-72157658951233625/

[mickthecactus]

It would be my privilege to escort you around Kew. You can buy lunch though...

The horseshoe thing I did mention above - it's the treetop walk in Kew.

[patricklondon]

There have been posts about the Barnes Wetland Centre here from me and tod 2.

Photos 6 and 7 above - I think the only other thing of note about them (apart from the fact that Hammersmith Bridge seems to turn up as decorative background in a fair number of TV series, and that it's quite a nice riverside walk along the towpath, all the way from Putney as far as you want to go) is that that's the bit of river you see if you watch the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race on TV. Just before Hammersmith Bridge, on the edge of the Wetlands Centre, is or was the Harrods Furniture Depository, a huge Victorian redbrick pile, which I think was subsumed into the property development around there when the old reservoirs were converted. That was always one of the landmark points in the race, because it's just before the river turns in quite a sharp bend - whoever's in front there is likely to win the race; in photos 8 and 9, Chiswick Bridge (the white bridge at the bottom) is the finishing line, and the crews come ashore at the boathouse just to the right of the bridge.

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[Deleted]

Very cool shots all.

Quite the shutterbug Bixa!

Leaving LaGuardia in NY it was quite clear and it was great fun to be able to point out and see all the different spots we had seen on the ground.

(Alot of new very tall buildings being built at present, nowhere else to go but vertical).

[patricklondon]

The green space in 10 is a local park - Gunnersbury Park to be precise. (thank you Google Maps!)

In 14, that isn't the Thames, but a lake (I think artificial) in Syon Park.

And well spotted on 16 and 4, bixa. Looking through the hole in the clouds in 4, I could see Tower Bridge and HMS Belfast. The Tower itself is a bit masked by the cloud.



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[bixaorellana]

Ah, thanks Mick! Yes, lunch is on me & we'll work out the drinks afterward.

And of course you did say that was the treetop walk but somehow I did not connect the two.

Patrick, I doubt most people know their home towns as well as you know yours! Thanks so much for the links. (everyone look at Reply #13 above to see Barnes Wetland Centre up close & personal) Absolutely wonderful details -- you really make the pictures come alive.

Good point, Casimira, about the changing faces of great cities.

And again I ask you all if there isn't something important & overlooked in picture #4. BIG hint:

[nycgirl]

Ooh, I know, it's Tower Bridge! I'm no London expert, but even I know that one.

These are dynamite photos! I've never in my life taken airplane shots this good. I'm always happy to get a window seat, though. (Last time I flew over the Grand Canyon, I was so annoyed because the guy across the aisle with the window seat had his window firmly closed, in complete defiance of the pilot's suggestion that passengers enjoy the view).

[bixaorellana]

Yaay, NYCGirl! Did our experts think it was too obvious, or did they gloss over #4 because it's so cloudy?

Poo on the guy with the closed window. I took an overnight bus to Chiapas once & my seatmate was a lovely high school boy who moved through the bus at daybreak convincing all the passengers to open their curtains as the sun came up. It was a gorgeous, jungly, misty vista of the dawn of time! I've always been grateful to that boy.

Thanks for the compliment on the pictures. I simply opened the glass window & got much better shots that way.

Actually, they're edited. Here is the unedited version of #11.

[lola]

How fun. Fine photos, you two. Of course, Patrick did spot Tower Bridge just as you were posting. You still haven't seen St. Paul's, Bixa, and a few other things, so you still need to go. I'd like to tag along on the Kew part. In fumobici's photo: Trafalgar Square fountains, Aldwych, the British Museum, Somerset House and my daughter Hannah's new school King's College London.

Love that boy on the bus.

[bixaorellana]

Patrick, I AM sorry! I guess I was posting as you were correctly identifying the bridge from the original picture. Should have known you'd catch it!

Kew, Kew with the two of you ~ what could be better, Lola?! So exciting about Hannah being at King's College.

And okay, I'll bite -- boy on the bus?

[lola]

Sorry, the overnight one from Chiapas.

[lugg]

Just brilliant -