As I'm away on holiday at the moment and haven't filmed any really fresh film as a result, this episode will have automatically appeared on LLTV's feed by the 'future date' scheduler. Filmed at the same time as the 'Bus Ride Through The City' episode, this journey starts at Aldwych and takes a bus ride down Fleet Street to St. Paul's Cathedral. It is not as 'exciting' as the City journey but again you do get to see the people and the buildings in this very old part of London. I hope I'm having a great time on holiday and will be back to start filming 'Summer In The City 2008' soon!

All Hallows-by-the-Tower is an ancient Anglican church located in Byward Street in the City of London, overlooking the Tower of London. This episode allows you to explore the nave with its blackened walls from a WWII bomb explosion & fire, then descend to the crypts to see burial remains and an ancient Roman road. All Hallows is steeped in drama and history. It was first established in 675 by the Saxon Abbey at Barking and was for many years named after the abbey, as All Hallows Barking. The church was built on the site of a former Roman building, traces of which have been discovered in the crypt. It was expanded and rebuilt several times between the 11th century and 15th century. Its proximity to the Tower meant that it acquired royal connections, with Edward IV making it a royal chantry and the beheaded victims of Tower executions being sent for temporary burial at All Hallows. The church was badly damaged by a nearby explosion in 1649, which demolished its west tower, and only narrowly survived the Great Fire of London in 1666. It owed its survival to Admiral William Penn, father of William Penn of Pennsylvania fame, who saved it by having the surrounding buildings demolished to create firebreaks. In 1926 a Roman pavement together with many artifacts was discovered many feet below the church. Restored in the late 19th century, All Hallows was gutted by The Blitz in World War II and required extensive reconstruction, only being rededicated in 1957. Many portions of the old church survived the war and have been sympathetically restored [2]. Its outer walls are 15th century, with a 7th century Saxon doorway surviving from the original church. Many brasses remain in the interior (where one of London's brass rubbing centres is now located). Three outstanding wooden statues of saints dating from the 15th and 16th centuries can also be found in the church, as can an exquisite font cover which was carved in 1682 by Grinling Gibbons for ₤12, and which is regarded by many as one of the finest pieces of carving in London. In 1999 the AOC Archaeology Group excavated the cemetery and made many significant discoveries[3] . The church has a museum called the Undercroft Museum. All Hallows-by-the-Tower is celebrated and remembered throughout the world in the use of its name both in Dublin (All Hallows College) and in Brisbane, Australia (All Hallows' School). (most text for the description of this episode from Wikipedia). (Opening sequence with street map and aerial photography from Google Maps).

You asked for it - and you wanted it in high definition! So here it is, another bus ride - this time the No.28 as it passes through the capital's financial heart - the City of London. This time I have included the original audio from the bus ride mixed with some ambient bass guitar music to give you a great journey through the historic City. If you fancy following the journey on a map: We start at Cannon Street at the junction with Bread Street, and head east towards Queen Victoria Street. Passing Bank underground station with the Bank of England building on the left, we head on to Threadneedle Street. The bus continues along Threadneedle Street to Bishopsgate (and the corner of Liverpool Street station) before finishing at the east end of the City at Shoreditch High Street. What is particularly interesting about this 10 minute journey is the sheer amount of building work going - particularly at the eastern end of the City. New shiny towers are being built where old building once stood. There may be a 'credit crunch' but the amount of financial trade that continues to head London's way is not denting the desire of banks and financial institutions to build here. The City's Griffin (a boundary marker at every main road entrance to the City) is all but lost amongst the builder's fencing as we leave. The building works also explain the rather jarring effects from the state of the roads in the City! This episode is in high definition but the bitrate, at 1500kbps, is half the normal bitrate for LLTV episodes so there are some compression 'artifacts' present during the journey. The lower bitrate is to fit in with the 525MB/month maximum download size of my podcast service account, and also my guarantee to subscribers of LLTV who have to keep an eye on their monthly download limit.

Summer In The City 2008, LLTV's continuous journey through central London, airs from the last week of July through to the first week of September. You can be part of it! Watch this short promotional video on how you can join in and influence the journey. (To save your bandwidth given that this is a promotion , this episode is 9.5MB in size and has 640x360 image resolution - not HD!).