Living the high life in London

 

You are probably wondering why I am drinking champagne in front of the Millemium Dome. 

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure myself. A couple of weeks ago, out of the blue, and invite came to visit the garden at the top of the Landmark Pinnacle, the highest residential tower in London. 

My guess is that someone did a web search for "garden" and my job title came up. After a bit of soul-searching, I decided to take a days holiday and go. A train down to London, bus across town to Mile End, and a stroll to the city. 

On arrival, I was greeted by a PR person and directed to the garden on the 75th floor. There was champagne, non-alcoholic mojito (smells odd, tastes OK) and tiny bits of food about the size of a 50p piece proffered on trays. A jazz band played in the corner, and I gawped at the view. 

 

Click on the photo for the full-size version. 

Around 30 journalists, and me, all admited the 1400 plants on the living wall and made small-talk, but the selling point is that view. One side you look along the curve of the Thames, on the other down a waterway, through the Thames barrier and out to sea. Canary Wharf is to your left, and we look down on it. 

Watching the sun set of the capital, I realised that I'll never have a better view of the city.  Sadly, the apartments are a bit out of my price range. 1 beds start at £580k and the three bed I'd like (space for model railways) is £1.5m. 

Things that strike you from this high up:

• London is green. Really green. Masses of trees and parks all over the place.
• Despite sitting on some very valuable land, there are a couple of housing estates that wouldn't look out of place in towns near me. It's a very mixed city. 
• The docks must have been amazing judging by the number of wharfs and basins still around. I'd love to have been this high up in the 1950s when they were still in operation. 

Before the main event, I took a stroll around dockland. The photos from this will be appearing on this blog in the future.