On Sunday 16th October as part of my weekend visit to London I took the first available
train to Victoria which meant crossing over platforms and entering the train as
it was almost ready to depart with an additional stop at Selhurst before
Clapham Junction, then taking District line train to Westminster for the Jubilee
line and to Canary Wharf where I hoped I would remember how to get to the West
India Dock Cineworld. I had look up on the Mini London AZ. Unfortunately, the
route did not come back and I had to ask the way until the otherwise finding excellent
street signings and the last part became familiar.
I had first got to know the
Cineworld at the former West India Docks when my eldest daughter lived in Stratford
and from where the Docklands Light Railway goes direct with the alternative Jubilee
line goes to Canary Wharf and central London in the opposite direction and the walk
from there. The car park adjacent to the new build multiplex which is also part
of a large fitness centre was also used and where the new purpose modern lots
of glass building runs parallel to the former dock storage buildings with
restaurants on the ground floor and loft apartments on the upper.
Canary Wharf the subject of
IRA terrorist major bombing because the former Thames river dockland had become
London’s second financial centre with a number of tower office blocks including
the tallest in the UK before the building of the Shard and proving work for
over 100000 people who mostly commute, hence being a transport hub and
providing a huge area of basement level retail shopping with a combined area of
one and half million square metres. The bombing took place in 1996 just before
Tony Blair became Prime Minister, did £150 million of damage and where although
a 90-minute warning was given two people died and a number were injured, some
permanently.
Canary Wharf is located on the
Isle of Dogs, a peninsular connected to the land at the top with a busy
motorway separating West India docklands with the Millwall inner and outer
docks in the south and the Thames Limehouse, Greenwich Reach and Blackwell
Reach parts of the Thames surrounding. There are no bridges with the Blackwall
Tunnel separating South London at North Greenwich from East London to one side
and the Rotherhithe Tunnel and Tower Bridge to the other. In terms of security
it is a good location and where the area is now constantly monitored and
patrolled 24/7. Canary Wharf Jubilee station is huge and cavernous and with
direct entry into the basement level shipping precincts. Not remembering This I
exited from the station into the large plaza and attempted to make way to the connecting
bridge which connects the Canary Wharf South Dock over the Middle Dock to still
name West India Northern dock and where ocean going ships can still be moored
as happened during the 2012 Olympic
games in particular and also visiting naval vessels. Having crossed the Bridge
and making my way passed the Brown’s Restaurant where I have sat out once for
Sunday lunch, registered and received a constant flow of emails and offers ever
since. Before crossing the bridge there is a pub in the corner of an office
block which provides less expensive food and large screenings of Premiership
Football.
The Cineworld has 11 screens
with entrances on the second and fourth floors and within area of comfortable
seating at ground level and additional seating at other levels where there are
other concessions. I was going first to see the film Inferno at 12.40 arriving
at 12.35 and then at 18.30 for the 25 Anniversary film of a live production of
Miss Saigon which was to end with encores from the original cast
At the Cineworld I noted a 20% concessions at a Wetherspoons with
instructions to turn right on leaving the cinema complex and going past the
fitness centre at the end of which there was the entrance to the car park and
across the roadway an older closed building. I decided to cross over the road
to the back of the wharf warehouse building and had to take great care because
of a lot of surface water after a downpour and where it was still raining l
used the hood on the coat rather than attempt to open the small umbrella I keep in its
left side pocket.The Wetherspoons occupies what in in fact a separate restored
Category 1 building which especially from the rear appears a fully integrated
part of the former warehouses of the
19th century
engineer-architects, George Gillks and John Rennie. The building has been the
offices of the West India Docks Building and also housed the Docklands Development
Corporation when the development was being created. The Ledger has a fabulous
inside with the main bar a high clear ceiling reminding of a pub in the center of
Nottingham owned by a rival chain which has been closing some of its
establishments. I sat in the raised area at the back overlooking the rest of
this area. There are three large areas to the side of the dividing corridor to
the front portico seating nearly 700 inside and couple of hundred outside which
is a feature of all the restaurants and bars which make the ground level of the
warehouse.
I still had a ticklish dry
cough and although it was after four did not feel immediately like a full meal
so treated myself to a cold pint of Fosters, enjoying noting the diners around
and continued to read The Season Ticket by Jonathan Tulloch studying the
written Geordie. I still needed lots of tissues but congratulated myself for
having commenced this venture. Around
five I felt hungry enough and ordered a basic beef burger, chips and with a
diet Pepsi for £5.50 less the 20% discount.
Fortunately, a little while later I noted a staff member taking back to
the kitchen what looked like my dish and I remembered I had said the table
number for breakfast 70 and not the present table 24 or was it 26? I found a
staff member who quickly brought me the meal, I already had the drink, and
discovered that I had ordered the chicken burger or a mistake had been made.
The chicken was dry and tasteless so I wished it had been the beef I had order
a curry which I had fancied. There was a real ale festival underway and also at
the George in Croydon and I knew that I would return even though the Wandsworth
Cinema is closer to hand and I plan to take out the London subscription extra
to attend the Imax at the Empire in Leicester Square, when the e ticketing is
available. The Museum of London Dockland
is nearby together with workshops and the area remains a very interesting part
of London which the casual tourist does not tend to explore.
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