Three years ago, we celebrated our wedding anniversary by having an afternoon tea cruise on the river Thames. Today, we did it again, courtesy of a Christmas present from my sister.
Last time, we went on the Victoria Line and changed at Victoria, but this year Citymapper, TfL AND Google all insisted we took the Northern Line to Bank and then the Circle or District to Tower Hill (or walk from Bank). So that's what we did, and arrived in nice time to board.
I hadn't upgraded us or anything, but we were shown to a table for two in the very front of the vessel, which was lovely! I didn't think the tea was anything special, and didn't eat two of my cakes (and wished I hadn't bothered with another one), but the sandwiches were nice, especially when we said we wouldn't eat chipotle on beetroot bread, We they gave us extra egg mayonnaise instead. There were only plain scones, not sultana ones, and the cream was not clotted or even whipped, so rather went everywhere! But I'm not complaining.
Our route today went right downriver to Greenwich, and a very apologetic captain explained that the tide would almost definitely be too high to prevent us going under Blackfriars Bridge on the way upstream, as, indeed it proved. We didn't mind, but it must have been very disappointing for the tourists.
When we got off, they made a total nonsense, and we had to wait while passengers boarded a Uber river bus - this was quite unnecessary, I thought, as there were plenty of other corridors we could have used. But we got off in the end, and then walked up to Monument and caught a bus home from there. We are now drinking fizz to celebrate!
There will be photos on Facebook, as per - I hope they don't duplicate other photos I've taken from the river on previous cruises, but it's hard not to photograph iconic London!