Colchester Town Hall

I was down in Colchester on my way to the Clacton airshow. It is now in its 25th year, but unfortunately low cloud on Thursday severely curtailed the flying display. Even the Red Arrows had to do a shortened programme, but still spectacular never-the-less.

Wandering along the High Street in Colchester, you can't help noticing the scaffolding around the town hall's clock tower.

The town hall was built 1898 - 1902, and was opened in May 1902 by the Prime Minister the Earl of Rosebery. It has been a Grade I listed building since 1968.

Clearly work is now required to repair the clock, including the replacement of glass with Perspex. the following photos show work in progress, with the clock faces (three in total) removed but still up on the scaffolding.

The tower, incidentally, is 162 feet tall. It also houses Colchester's oldest bell (cast somewhere between 1380 and 1405), although not used to ring the hours.

Old Kent Road (Londonopoly #7)

It has been a long time since we last visited the Londonopoly board (based on a well-known game that shall not be named for legal reasons) - as far back as February 2014 in fact.

We have visited some of the posher sites, so now it is time to visit the cheapest square on the board, good old Old Kent Road.

I was half expecting not to find any clocks at all, and this looked likely to be the case half way along the 1.3 km walk, but then Lord Nelson came to my rescue in true British swashbuckling heroic style.

Or rather in the form of the Lord Nelson pub on the corner of, where else, Trafalgar Avenue.

The Old Kent Road is not only the old road to Kent, but it is truly an old road. It is currently part of the A2, but before that was part of the Roman Watling Street, and the Roman's themselves merely upgraded an ancient Celtic trackway.

One upon a time the Old Kent Road had 39 pubs, but the Lord Nelson is the only one surviving (although several others are now bars).

And a fact I hadn't realised is that the Old Kent Road is the only location on the Monopoly board that is south of the Thames.

So good old Lord Nelson on the good old very old Old Kent Road.

I will try not to leave it another two years before another Londonopoly posting.