Greenwich

Yesterday we went on an NYU-sponsored trip to Greenwich. We saw the Old Royal Naval College, the National Maritime Museum, Queen's House, and, of course, the Prime Meridian. We started off with an hour boat ride on the Thames (which, after two weeks in London, I realized is pronounced the "tems", not the "thames". Good job Pratik).

I was pleasantly surprised by all the history of Greenwich from John Harrison's maritime clocks to Christopher Wren's baroque architecture at the Royal Naval Hospital (now the Old Royal Naval College, which I think is part of Greenwich University) to Inigo Jones's classical construction of the Queen's House. According to Wikipedia, the Queen's House, now only used as a museum, will be a VIP center during the 2012 Olympics.

It's interesting to note that the Prime Meridian is only a convention. It was agreed upon in 1884 since over two-thirds of ship maps used it as their longitudinal meridian. This phenomenon related to the Greenwich Observatory and the fact that some guy (I forget his name, possibly John Flamsteed, the first Astronomer Royal) spent most of his life studying the stars and making maps from Greenwich. I'm supposing that in these maps Greenwich is the reference point. Basically because King Charles II commissioned an observatory in Greenwich and some guy used it a lot, we now consider Greenwich to be the center of universal time. Nonetheless, standing on the Prime Meridian was ridiculously enjoyable.


Eastern Hemisphere on my left, Western on my right.


The Queen's House with its classical architecture. Interesting, but I'm always a bigger fan of baroque. There are interesting paintings and historical explanations inside.


The red ball tells time for Greenwich. For 55 minutes each hour, it lies at the bottom, but for the last five minutes it rises to the top. At the top of every hour, it falls. Since the building is on a hill, it was used by the ships on the Thames to tell when the top of the hour came, to calibrate their clocks, and to set sail.

This building is part of the Old Royal Naval College, designed by Christopher Wren. The architecture is simply amazing. The columns on the bottom of the picture stretch for an entire block on both sides with domes, bells, and benches aplenty.

This painting depicts William and Mary and lies on the ceiling of the Painted Hall in the Old Royal Naval College. Again, simply amazing. The entire hall, from floor to ceiling, is covered by similarly detailed and vivid paintings. The tour guide was explaining the history and politics shown in all the paintings, but I couldn't get over just the artwork to even start listening to him.