London 30.6.2017

Today we decided that we would go to Hampstead Heath to visit Kenwood House.  We were a little later leaving the apartment this morning, in hindsight not such a great idea as the bus ride to Trafalgar Square that would normally take 25 minutes took at least an hour. Not only was the traffic congested, due to the Changing of the Guards, but the bus driver was very tentative, as though it was his first time driving!!! We changed buses at Trafalgar Square and headed to Camden Town, changed buses again to Hampstead Heath, a lovely village.

John thought that Kenwood House, would be quite close, however after asking around, we needed to catch another bus to the top of the Heath.  In the end it took us nearly 4 hours to get to Kenwood House.  On arrival at Kenwood House, a lovely Georgian House, on an 18th century estate.

There was a lovely man at the entrance, and after hearing of our travels, took us to what used to be the Dining Room, as he thought we needed a rest.  The first thing we noticed was the Self Portrait by Rembrandt on the wall, along with a Vermeer and a Van Dyck.

After a short time we then toured the house, which has a quite a number of amazing artworks, as well as the most elegant library.

In 1910 the 6th Earl of Mansfield sold Kenwood and it was bought by Edward Guinness to house his art collection.  He never lived in the house and bequeathed it to the Nation. We were very pleased we persisted and made it to look at this beautiful House and its contents.

We then came home via Euston Station,
to purchase our train tickets to Tamworth for Saturday.    This statue of Robert Stevenson is outside the entrance to Euston Station.









We then had an early dinner at Zizzi's at Tower Bridge before heading back to the apartment.