A few days ago, I was in central London with some free time. It was a very cold day, but at least the sun was out and London was looking its best. I fancied a gentle walk, as much as anything to take in London's changing riverside.
The pictures here are from a walk between Battersea Power Station and the London Eye along the river bank and popping onto various bridges as I went. It was the middle of the afternoon by the time I started in beautiful sunshine, and I ended well after sunset.
Battersea Power Station is all newly — and beautifully — restored: but, as is the way of these things, it has been repurposed as a shopping centre, a kind of Bluewater-on-Thames, empty of customers on a cold January midweek afternoon. Incidentally, around the Power Station are some very pleasant eateries: I stopped for a late Malaysian lunch at Roti King, a most enjoyable and friendly place.
I won't say much about the pictures, but I'll add a caption to each. I just took the Sony A1, 16-35 and 24-105 lenses. My general philosophy for an afternoon like this is one-camera-one-lens. Two lenses are more than I generally like to carry, but there were some specific shots I'd thought of with the 16-35, the opening picture being one of them. I didn't take a tripod, and for long exposures relied either on the camera's own stabilisation, or just simply perched the camera on a convenient wall or barrier.
One small observation: London felt like it was back to its old self, which is a wonderful relief. There were endless tourists, many from Asia and frequently queuing patiently for the most Instagram-friendly spot for a selfie. I ended the day getting the tube from Westminster where there were hordes of workers on their way home. Unsurprisingly, there were the sounds of a demo coming down Whitehall — the surprise comes from the fact that the nurses are on strike for the first time in my lifetime, and it was their voices I could hear.