London: Kingston; Friday, 10 December, 2021

The original plan for this weekend was to be in Nuremberg for the Christmas Markets, but for several reasons that wasn’t going to be possible (the fact that Germany had cancelled the markets a couple of weeks earlier almost being irrelevant by then). So instead I was having a weekend slightly closer to home in Kingston upon Thames.

As I still had the half days annual leave, originally booked for Nuremberg, I finished work at lunch and after a quick bit to eat headed off on my long and arduous 43 minute journey across South London.

After checking in to the hotel I dropped my stuff off and went for a wander, firstly down to the river and then along the riverside into the centre of the town.

I went to College in Kingston and in places the town hasn’t changed in the (many) years since I last spent time here, but in other locations the change has been considerable – not least of all around the area where the Hogsmill River empties into the Thames. Back in the 1990’s this was a gap in the river front walk as the only access over the river was back on the high street, and in reality you weren’t missing much as the river emptied into the Thames in the same way a sewer might. Today Charter Quay is a posh retail and dining area with the river channelled out into a small wetland and bridges built across the mouth, allowing you to walk continuously along the whole of the river front in Kingston.

From the river I wandered back inland a little to the area in front of the Guildhall and the Coronation Stone. This sarsen stone is reputed to the coronation stone of several local Saxon kings in the 10th century – Kingston being the meeting point of Wessex and Mercia until the two kingdoms were united.

My next stop was the Kingston Museum. This small museum is located next to the towns library on the main ring road that runs pretty much through the centre of Kingston. Inside the exhibition looks at the history of Kingston from the earliest pre-historic findings through to the modern day, with a particular focus on the towns roll as a trading centre and, during the 20th century, the home to the Sopwith aircraft company latter British Aerospace.

After the museum I wandered back through the centre of town and stopped off at the marketplace. Having missed out on the chance of a genuine German Christmas Market it was quite nice to find a faux-German Christmas Market here in Kingston, complete with Glühwein and Bratwurst.

I had a bit of a wander around the market, though quite a lot of the stalls were actually the standard market stalls just dressed up with a little tinsel, before heading back to the hotel to freshen up and digest my bratwurst before heading out for a proper dinner.