High Holborn – Sunday 12th November 2023

Holborn sits in the middle of central London and is synonymous with the legal profession. The area includes Hatton Garden – the jewellery quarter and centre of the country’s diamond trade – and is home to around 300 businesses and 90 jewellery shops.  We walked up Hatton Garden on our way to visit the Postal Museum, but this being a Sunday nothing was open and it was very quiet.  After our visit we headed back to Holborn for the tube, stopping at the Waterstones, which is housed in a modernist building that was designed by architect Frederick Etchells for Crawford’s Advertising in 1930.

The Postal Museum and Rail Mail Train

The Museum was very interesting and included a trip on the Post Office Railway, also known as the Mail Rail Train, with amusing commentary and stops for informative videos.  This train carried post underground from Paddington in the west to Whitechapel in the east from 1927 until its closure in 2003.

UK Parliament

The day before our visit to Holborn we spent the day at the UK Parliament.  In the morning we did a tour of the Elizabeth Tower, arriving next to the famous bell, Big Ben, just before midday, in time to hear the quarter chimes and twelve ‘bongs’, which are famous across the world.  We were not allowed to take photographs on this tour for security reasons.  In the afternoon we did a tour of the Houses of Commons and Lords.  Again, no photography was allowed on the tour, although we were able to take pictures in Westminster Hall (where the Queen lay in state in September 2022 following her death) and the outer room of the House.  Both tours were excellent, and well worth doing.