It is absolutely nothing unusual for me to be awake at 04:00 when I am on holiday, but that is normally because I am jet lagged. I did not expect this to happen in my own country. Thankfully, I fell asleep again about an hour later. I woke up again around 07:30 and figured that this was an acceptable time to be awake. I worked on my trip report for a bit and then played a game on my iPad.
Graham was awake about an hour later. We got up, had a shower, and got ready. Then we headed downstairs to breakfast. Graham had a coffee, plain yoghurt with berry compote, vanilla yoghurt, and a couple of croissants. I was not particularly hungry and just had an orange juice and some granola with milk. Once we had finished our breakfast, we went back upstairs to get ready for the day.
We walked the short distance to the local Docklands Light Railway station. While we waited for our train, we had a look at the Underground map and plotted a loose plan for the day. We only stayed on the Docklands Light Railway for a couple of stops, and then changed to the District Line, which took us close to our first destination, the Victoria and Albert Museum.
I had been to the Victoria and Albert Museum twice previously and this is not a museum that holds a great deal of attraction to me. It is what Graham and I call an attic as it is basically just an accumulation of stuff. I give it that it is valuable stuff and some of it is pretty and interesting. However, this is still not an incentive for me to go out of my way to visit. It does however have one redeeming feature, which is an amazing chandelier by Dale Chihuly. This was the sole reason why we were heading there that day.
We arrived in the basement and headed up to the ground floor. We walked through a couple of galleries and through the gift shop to the main entrance, which is where the Chihuly chandelier is located. I have to give them that the building is stunning.
I also spotted something interesting when I looked up. I wanted to get some photos from higher up. This gave me the opportunity to check out what had caught my eye earlier. I realised as soon as I saw this that it came from a church. This was actually the Hereford Screen, which was a choir screen that was made in 1862 for Hereford cathedral. It was unveiled at the 1862 International Exhibition before it was installed at Hereford cathedral. In 1967, it was removed from Hereford cathedral as choir screens had fallen out of favour. It was stored in wooden packing cases by Coventry’s Herbert Museum waiting for it to be re-erected in a new museum dedicated to Coventry’s Industrial past, but funds were never available. In 1984, it was handed over to the Victoria and Albert Museum, but it was in poor condition at the time. In 2001, it was restored to its former glory and is now on display near the main entrance.
Once we had a look at this, I took a few photos as the building is absolutely beautiful. Then we headed out. We walked to our next stop, which was Harrods.
When I did some research to check if there are currently some temporary Chihuly installations in London I soon realised that I was out of luck. However, I did find out that there is another Chihuly chandelier in Harrods. I was really surprised by this as I had never noticed this before and we had been inside Harrods a number of times. This is called the Amber and Gold Chandelier and was commissioned by Harrods in 2014. I don’t think we had been to Harrods since then, but it was not particularly easy to find either. I knew that it was located on the ground floor near the Grand Hall entrance. However, I had no clue where this entrance was. We walked the whole length of the shop. Then we headed towards the back. Somebody stopped me to get me to try some perfume. I asked her where the Grand Hall entrance was. Initially she looked a little confused, but then she pointed me to an entrance around the corner. I could see the chandelier as soon as I turned the corner. It was definitely worth the effort. I spent some time admiring it and taking photos. I was amused by the name of the entrance though. It sounded rather “grand” for what felt very much like a tradesmen’s entrance.
Once we had thoroughly admired the chandelier, we headed towards the underground to take to head to Covent Garden. We were going to do another treasure hunt. Normally, we use the booklets of a company called Mystery Guide. They do have three Mystery Guides for London, but they are all for the City of London, which is not an area that interests us. I had come another company that offers this kind of thing called Puzzle Detectives. They offer treasure hunts for the Southbank and also for the West End. Those are two areas we really like. I got them both. I was not sure how the day would pan out, but we decided to start with the West End one and figured if we still had energy left at the end of this, we could do the second one.
I was somewhat surprised by the start an end point of this, which were Covent Garden and Leicester Square. They are very close together. The total distance between those two points is only 0.3 miles and I was not entirely sure how you could fit 15 clues into such a minimal distance and make this last for two to three hours. However, we were weaving in and out multiple times between those points leading to a distance of 1.6 miles. Add to this that we overshot once or twice and we were probably looking at around 2 miles. This made more sense.
Our starting point was Covent Garden Market. This is my absolutely favourite spot in London. Whenever I come to London, I end up there sooner or later. I did not really expect that Covent Garden would have any surprises for me. I was wrong. Near one of the entrances are a number of wooden boards with historical byelaws and fines. I had never seen those before. In my defence, I normally enter the market via the closest entry to the underground station and exit near either the Royal Opera House or St. Paul’s Church. The byelaws and particularly the fines were needed to solve the first clue. This was a real gem and discoveries like this are the reason why I like this kind of treasure hunt so much.
For the next clue, we just had to walk across the square to St. Paul’s Church. We have walked past this church countless times but never stopped to have a look at this. We did not spend much time there this time either. However, we did find another gem that was hidden in plain sight, which was an inscription commemorating the first Punch and Judy show. The clue was quite cryptic and needed a hint for this. I solved the clue, but it did quite sink in until later how this helped to solve the mystery. I had overlooked something crucial, but when we sat down towards the end to see if I had missed anything, I discovered the missing piece of the puzzle, and this helped me to eliminate one of the suspects.
We had one more clue to solve at Covent Garden, which was a bronze piece of artwork outside the Apple Market. This is something else that had never registered even though it is not exactly small. This was even more cryptic than the last clue. I did come to the correct answer with the help of a hint, but if I am honest, I am still not sure what this was actually supposed to mean.
After this we left Covent Garden behind and headed towards the Strand. Our next clue was above the door of Simpson’s in the Strand. This restaurant opened in 1828 and has been in the present location since 1904. This clue was not the easiest either. There is a mural with chess pieces above the door. To solve the clue, I needed the white chess pieces. However, the chess pieces on the mural were silver and gold. I figured that they probably meant the silver pieces, but this did not make any sense. I then tried again with the gold pieces and ended up with word, which I needed to solve one of the clues down the line.
The next thing that caught my eye had absolutely nothing to do with the treasure hunt. A few doors down Simpson’s in the Strand was a bench with Paddington. This was the second one that I have come across this year. I still have not checked out the one here in Manchester. I really need to do something about this. Graham took a couple of photos of me and Paddington and then we moved on towards the next clue.
The next point of interest was the Adelphi Theatre, which was not a clue, but helped to find the next clue. There was a little bit about the history of this in the booklet. A theatre has existed in this spot since 1806, and this actually makes it the third oldest theatre in London after the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and the Theatre Royal Haymarket. The neighbouring Vaudeville Theatre also makes the top five of the oldest theatres in London.
The actual clue looked quite modern. This was a clock on the corner of a building. However, there was some history behind this. The clock itself dates back 1957 and replaced an older circular plaque on the building. It commemorates The Civil Service Supply Association, which was founded in 1864 by Post Office clerks. The Strand building opened in 1877. It suffered severe fire damage on July 1982, which forced the business to close permanently. The building was redeveloped following the fire and is now home to office and retail space. The clock however remains the celebrate the heritage of the building.
When we turned off The Strand, things turned a little arty or even avant-garde. The next clue was the Oscar Wilde statue on Adelaide Street. It was called A Conversation with Oscar Wilde and was unveiled in 1998. It takes the form of a bench-like green granite sarcophagus, with a bust of Wilde emerging from the upper end, with a hand clasping a cigarette. It is quite strange.
Just round the corner was another modern piece of art, but this has a practical purpose. It is a lightwell that provides natural daylight to the underground crypt of St Martin in the Fields. It consists of two overlapping geometric circles that are engraved with a poem by former Poet Laureate Andrew Motion. It was this poem that was needed to solve the clue.
The next clue was in an area that you could quite possibly walk past and never know that it is there. Goodwin’s Court is a small alley near Trafalgar Square. The entrance looks like doorway. Once you are three the entrance, it widens up a little. According to the nearby plaque, the well-preserved row of shops was built in 1690 and was predated by a passage known as Fishers Alley. It was this plague that we needed to solve the next Actress and mistress to Charles II, Nell Gwynn, is thought to have been one of the earliest residents of the Court. This was another real gem.
Our next clue was in Cecil Court. This is often referred to as Booksellers’ Row. Cecil Curt is utterly charming and features gas lamps, preserved shopfronts, and around 20 independent specialty shops. In the early 1900s, the street was nicknamed “Flicker Alley” because of its links with the early British film industry. The young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart lived at one of the properties here in 1764 during his European tour. We were amused by a sign in one of the shop windows, which stated “Harry Potter has nothing to do with this street. J.K Rowling did not get inspiration from this street. Ask your tour guide for your money back.” I could however see why people may think that Cecil Court had inspired Diagon Alley.
Our next clue was based around an Agatha Christie Memorial on Cranbourne Street. The memorial depicts a book with Christie at its centre. It is about 2.4 metres high and made of bronze. Some titles of her most popular books and plays, in English, and in some of the many languages into which Christie’s work has been translated appear on the memorial. Around the base is a biography and this was what we needed for the clue. This was the most involved clue of the treasure hunt.
The next two clues were in Chinatown. We had passed Chinatown on a couple of past visits to London, but never really explored the area. It was nice to get the chance to have a good look around.
After this, we headed to Leicester Square. The clue was based around Swiss Court. The area was formerly home to the Swiss Centre, which was completed in the late 1960s as a showcase and trade centre for Switzerland. Over the years, the connection with Switzerland faded out. Several shops remained vacant, and British souvenir stalls took over the commercial spaces from the late nineties. The Swiss Centre was demolished in 2008. It was replaced by the building now housing the W London Hotel and M&M’s World. However, there are still two elements of Swiss Court. The first is a “cantonal tree” which displays the coats of arms of 26 cantons of Switzerland and was presented as a gift from Switzerland to mark the Silver Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II in May 1977. This is what we needed to solve the clue. The second is a glockenspiel featuring 27 bells and 11 moving figures which was originally attached to the front of the Swiss Centre. It was removed when the building was demolished. It was refurbished and was returned to Swiss Court as a freestanding, 10 metre monument in late 2011.
By this time, I was running out of steam, but we had two clues left. There was definitely no question about doing a second treasure hunt. However, we still had two clues left for this one. We headed away from Leicester Square again and in the general direction of St Martin in the Fields. We were a little surprised by this as we already had a clue near there. The clue ended up being near the back entrance National Portrait Gallery. What we needed was described as the largest stone plaque you have ever seen. We needed to use this to find another word, which together with a word from another clue would be used to eliminate another suspect. Finding the word was no issue, but I could not figure out what the instruction was asking me to do. The hint did not help either and in the end, I referred to the answer on the last page. It was only when I went through the book once more when working on the trip report that I realised that everything, I needed to solve the clue had literally stared me in the face.
After this , we headed back to Leicester Square. The final task was using close up photos to find buildings around the square and then locate them on a map. Each location had a letter attached to it and once you put them in the right order, this should have revealed the location where the villain was trying to escape to. We found four of the six buildings, but we could not find the last two for love nor money. There was quite a lot of scaffolding in the area, and we were suspecting that the remaining two buildings were covered by scaffolding. I was good with not finding the final piece of the puzzle.
Once we had decided that we were done, we figured it was time for lunch. We had a quick look around Leicester Square, but there was nothing that caught our eye. There were a bunch of chain restaurants and most of them were essentially fast food.
We decided to head back to Chinatown. Pretty much as soon as we entered Chinatown, somebody tried to get our attention. The restaurant was called San Chiu Dim. This was a Cantonese restaurant that offered both an a la carte menu and an extensive dim sum menu. I had quick look at the menu, and this looked good to me. Graham was happy with whatever I decided. We stuck with the dim sum menu. I asked our server how many dishes he recommended. He suggested 3 or 4 dishes per person. We decided to start with 6 between the two of us and figured we could always order something else if we were still hungry. Again, Graham let me take the lead. I went with three steamed dishes, two fried dishes and on grilled dish. We had “Xiao Long Bao” Shanghai pork soup dumplings, “Siu Mai” pork and prawn dumplings, roasted pork char siu buns, rice paper wrapped sesame prawn rolls, Vietnamese pork and prawn spring rolls, and grilled prawn and chive dumplings. Graham had a couple of glasses of iced lemon tea, and I had a couple of glasses of lychee juice. Everything hit the spot and by the end of this, we were stuffed. If we end up there again, I think five dishes would be a better idea. I was positively surprised that this was great value by London standards.
Once we had finished lunch, we headed in the general direction of Leicester Square underground station. I found a Chinese convenience store on the way. I got some soft drinks to take back to the hotel. Then we carried on to the station. We tried to work out what the best way would be to get back to the hotel. We initially planned to take the underground from Leicester Square to South Kensington and retrace our steps from there. Graham suggested that we check out the bus routes. There were two bus routes going from the bus stop right in front of Leicester Square station that went to a station on the Jubilee Line.
There was no bus for ages. I studied the underground map on my phone and noticed that there we could get a train from Leicester Square station to a station that had an interchange to the Jubilee Line. I mentioned this to Graham, and he was up for this. When we got to the platform, there was a train sitting there, but that looked pretty full. The next train was only a couple of minutes behind. We waited for this. We managed to get some seats on this train. The interchange between the Piccadilly line and the Jubilee line was quite far, but we were on no timetable. When we got to the platform, we only had a short wait for the next train. This train was not particularly busy, and we got two seats together. This was a much quicker route compared with the route we had taken that morning. We changed onto the Docklands Light Railway at Canning Town. This proved to be a bit complicated. Canning Town is where multiple lines of the Docklands Light Railway come together, and different lines go from different levels. We headed for the wrong platforms first. Once we realised that we were in the wrong place, we headed for the correct platform. Our train arrived shortly afterwards.
When we got back to the hotel, we headed straight to our room. I had got Graham a bottle of lemon tea and I had a Hong Kong lemon cola drink. We both made ourselves comfortable and enjoyed our drinks. Graham fell asleep soon afterwards. I started to read and figured I would work on my trip report in a bit. Fortunately, I had set an alarm to take my medication later in the day and also for the next morning as I did not do much reading. I ended up falling asleep with my iPad in my hand. When the alarm went off, I got up to take my tablets and to get ready for bed. Soon afterwards, I was asleep again and I slept through until the following morning.
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