Tower Bridge and St Katherines Docks

One of London's most famous landmarks and one of its most hidden are located next to each other!

Tower Bridge is an icon of London with its rising road-decks that hinge up to allow traffic through. The bridge was opened on 30th June 1894 but, thanks to its co-location with the Tower of London, the chosen design makes it look a lot older.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_bridge for more information.

Right next to Tower Bridge's north pier (so on the north side of the Thames, surrounded by wharves and more modern buildings), are St. Katherine's Docks.

From pre-Roman times, the area known as St Katharine Docks has been a centre of commerce and trading. But the real roots of today's complex of commercial and residential buildings can be traced back to the 10th century, when King Edgar (959-975) gave 13 acres of land on the site to 13 knights with the "right" to use the land for profit which provided the basis for trade in foreign goods which continued for a thousand years.

Today St. Katherine's Docks are a secret haven for old barges made into beautiful homes, yachts and the latest millionaire floating 'ships'.

Note: All the shots in this episode were filmed on 3 February 2008 with the exception of the first 'aerial' shot which was filmed in May 2007 from the top of the Fire Monument, currently closed for refurbishment. I make a point of only using fresh film but I couldn't resist setting the scene with the older shot, especially as I couldn't do it again on the later filming day.