Favorite Fotos: love those bridges!

It's hard to believe that for most of its history, London only had one bridge across the Thames—that being the famous London Bridge of song and story. There are lots more now, and it's so much fun to cross them, and observe the sometimes surging, sometimes choppy river from these vantage points. Plus, they're great places from which to check out the riverside scenery.

But they're also fine pieces of scenery themselves, and I thought I'd take you on a little downstream tour. (Their histories are also interesting, and you can read about them by following the links. The website I used for bridge history is Tour UK's handy London bridges section.)

The furthest bridge upstream that I encountered* was Putney Bridge, which abuts Bishop's Park and is only a 10-minute walk from Craven Cottage, where we saw our Premier League football game. Not much to look at, architecturally, but it still makes a nice photo subject:


Next comes Battersea Bridge, in the foreground in the picture below. The frou-frou-y thing further downstream, which is also pictured at the top and bottom of this post, is the Albert Bridge (everything named for Albert—and there's an Albert-this or Albert-that almost everywhere you look—is frou-frou-y, in keeping with the style of his times).


Next comes Chelsea Bridge, and I must thank Henry for the nice photo at the right, of the crest at the beginning of the bridge span. Every bridge from Battersea on down (with a couple of exceptions) has a different architectural or decorative interest, making it easy to know where you are on the river, not to mention offering plenty of photo opportunities that can't be turned down.

A good example of a well-decorated bridge is the next one in line, Vauxhall. I have a photo here showing most of the span, along with the cool complexes across the river alongside it, taken from the Chelsea Embankment. Next is a detail of its decorative elements.

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Lambeth comes next, and it has the distinction of offering the best views of the Houses of Parliament. At least that's what Hal's guidebook said, and we tended to agree. You can see those lovely buildings here, with the bridge in the foreground. (The blue-ribbon view is actually from the embankment on the south side of the bridge, a bit further downstream from where this was taken.)


And here we are on the other side of the HP, looking back upstream at them and their companion bridge, Westminster.


Next comes one of the nondescript bridges, Waterloo. Although it has an interesting history, as you can read by following the link.


Next comes one of the most interesting, Blackfriars. For one thing, it's a double bridge, with one span carrying rail, and the other auto and pedestrian, traffic. We were told by our boat tour guide that the reason the large pillars (left from an earlier railroad bridge at the location) remain in between the bridges is that they couldn't be removed without damaging the bridges' foundations. There's no mention of that reasoning in the Tour UK's history, though, so I wonder if they were just kept for their picturesque value? At any rate, you can just see the red pillars under the span in the photo at the left. Below is a more panoramic view of the bridge, with another glimpse of the red pillars.


Undoubtedly one of the most fun bridges comes next, the Millennium footbridge. It's also extremely useful, since it takes you right from St. Paul's to the the Tate Modern and the Globe, and associated entertainment venues on the South Bank. Known as the "wibbledy, wobbledy bridge" because of some (since corrected) problems when it first opened, it makes crossing the river extra exciting! On the right is a close-up view of the bridge and Tate Modern across the river, and below is looking at it, back towards St. Paul's.


Only one more bridge left that I have a picture of, Southwark, and it's only a shot of the identifying decoration along the roadway, in its characteristic green color.

Next in line is London Bridge, which of course everyone wants to look like the old bridge in the stories. But in its current incarnation it's probably the blandest of the lot, and not really worth a photo.

By contrast, the last bridge that I encountered is the Tower Bridge, and it's worth many photos. So many, in fact, that I'm going to save them for another post, probably one highlighting the major tourist attractions. So I'll close today with another look at old Albert's bridge—Victorian decorative excess or not, it does look stunning at night, don't you think? [Thanks to Henry for this lovely photo.]

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*This statement was proved inaccurate when I started a detailed analysis of my photos. I realized that I'd actually seen—and photographed—the next bridge upstream: Hammersmith. Here it is: