It’s another grey and chilly day, a day on which to keep moving.

Aboard the 205

After a late start, we sallied forth and caught a 205 bus.

Whitechapel High Street

We broke our journey in Whitechapel. Compared with the last couple of days, the streets are busier and a few more shops are open.

Costa

Costa was open and so we went in for coffee.

Westfield

We resumed our journey and arrived in Stratford where we entered the shopping centre called Westfield.

Down the slope

We then took the escalator down the long slope (which probably has a name though I don’t know what it is).

Stratford Centre

There we entered the older shopping area known as the Stratford Centre.

PizzaExpress

We walked through to the exit at the other end. Here is a branch of PizzaExpress and we went in for lunch.

Joan Littlewood
by Philip Jackson

Outside was a statue of theatre director Joan Littlewood (1914-2002) by Philip Jackson.

Stratford Market Village

Within the shopping centre there is a covered market called Stratford Market Village. We went for a walk round it.

Christmas decorations

We crossed back through the shopping centre which still had its Christmas decorations. I was surprised at how busy the shopping centres were, almost as though the “Christmas rush” were still in progress.

Aboard the 108

We now boarded a 108 bus. This is a single-decker and was crowded. A feature of this route is that it passes under the Thames.

Greenwich Peninsula

The bus brought us to the Greenwich Peninsula, an area for entertainments and site of the famous (notorious?) structure called the Millennium Dome.

Costa

As the weather was chilly and it was beginning to rain, we did not feel like walking about and so went to Costa for a coffee before starting back.

Millennium Dome

On the way out, I took this distance shot of the Millennium Dome, in my opinion one of the most ridiculous and inappropriate pieces of architecture ever conceived. It reminds me of a cowpat with straws stuck in it.

Aboard the 108

At the bus stop quite a crowd was waiting for the 108 as they run only about every 15 minutes or so. When it arrived, we all hurried aboard, making it uncomfortably packed. It was a relief to exit it at Bow Church.

Aboard the 205

We had a little while to wait for our next bus but it arrived in due course. We went aboard the 205, which was mercifully almost empty, and it carried us through the City and back to the Angel.

By now it was dark and rain was falling so we were happy to return home and conclude our outing.