Incredible view of the London Skyline from the Sky Garden.
Visiting the Sky Garden is the cheapest way to see London from the top. Recently I have written about London seen from The Shard. As we know getting into The Shard is not the cheapest experience. You have to pay 26 £ admissions per person.
The Sky Garden gives you the opportunity to get a birds-eye view of London for free. The basic condition for it is making a booking a few weeks before. You can do it from this website.
We came to the Sky Garden in late October on Sunday. Being in a rush we reached the main doors around 10:50 a.m. and could join the last group of people without payable admission. Only a few hours in the morning are reserved for this purpose. After 11 am admission is bookable with the fee.
After several seconds of the fast trip by lift, we entered the Garden site. This place is amazing. The garden on the top looks awesome, however, the vegetation looks quite confined. The plants are located in a few sections, which makes the garden fairly big. Everything looks very nice with a restaurant beyond, behind glass.
Pic. 1 – 3 The vegetation in the Sky Garden.
Anyway, my basic aim for this visit was to enjoy the beautiful panorama of Greater London and its environs. It was my first attempt to see London from this altitude because I visited the Shard nearly 1 year later. I can admit, that I was awestruck by the Bird’s eye perspective of the United Kingdom capital. Unfortunately, the visibility was not good that day. Compared to the day, when I reached the top of the highest building in Europe the haze was thicker. It gave me the opportunity to have around a 30 km line of sight. Because it was before I bought a DSLR camera I used my old Canon Powershot SX 130 IS with 12x superzoom to enclose distance objects. I put my photos from the north direction following the azimuth route to make the landscape easily readable.
Let’s have a look at the most remarkable sights, that you can experience being at the top of the Walkie-Talkie skyscraper. I would like clearly show you what exactly you can see from the Sky Garden. There are many places to cover. The viewpoint is around 50m lower than the top of The Shard, though many spots of Greater London are still clearly visible.
The basic disadvantage of taking pictures through the glass is white ghosts caused by reflecting the external light. As an outcome, the quality of the photos is quite poor.
Pic. 4 The Tower 42, Leadenhall Building and 30th St. Mary’s Axe seen from the top of the Walkie Talkie skyscraper, click to enlarge.
Pic. 5 The Queen Elisabeth Olympic Park is seen from the Sky Garden.
Pic. 6 View of eastern London from the Sky Garden
Pic. 7 View towards Orange Tree Hill (around 50m.a.s.l.) near Romford from 26 km distance, click to enlarge.
Pic. 8 The eastern part of Greater London seen from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 9 View the London City Airport (LCY) and Edible Oils refinery in the background, click to enlarge.
Pic. 10 The Canary Wharf seen from the Walkie Talkie building, click to enlarge.
Pic. 11 Zoom towards the Thames estuary, click to enlarge
Pic. 12 View the eastern part of Greater London with Canary Wharf and the Tower of London at the front, click to enlarge.
Pic. 13 The Tower Bridge seen from the top of the Walkie-Talkie skyscraper, click to enlarge.
Pic. 14 The Tower of London seen from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 15 View from the Sky Garden towards Brockley, Forest Hill, and North Downs beyond on the left of course, and the Mariner’s Hill community near Westerham (30 km distance) on the right-hand side, click to enlarge.
Pic. 16 London City Hall and Thames rives saw from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 17 View from the Sky Garden towards Westow Hill (112m.a.s.l.) – one of the highest hills in London and the North Downs range 20km ahead, click to enlarge.
Pic. 18 The Shard and south bank as seen from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 19 And take a detailed look on the Shard view platform and see the people there :), cropped picture, click to enlarge.
Pic. 20 View from the Sky Garden towards the Strata residential building, click to enlarge.
Pic. 21 View on the Thames River and south bank from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 22 View the St. George Wharf Tower and Battersea Powerplant station beyond, click to enlarge.
Pic. 23 View on the Westminster with Palace of Westminster, Portland House, and Chelsea beyond, click to enlarge.
Pic. 24 The London Eye seen from the Walkie-Talkie building, click to enlarge.
Pic. 25 Zoom on the Big Ben and London Eye from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 26 View from the Sky Garden on the Thames River and the western part of Greater London, click to enlarge.
Pic. 27 Zoom towards the London Hilton Building and the Heathrow Airport (LHR) beyond, click to enlarge.
Pic. 28 View at the Thames River, the Shell Mex House, London Hilton Building, Hyde Park, and Notting Hill area, click to enlarge.
Pic. 29 The St. Paul Cathedral and BT Tower as seen from the Sky Garden, click to enlarge.
Pic. 30 View from the top of the Walkie Talkie building on the University of London and the Wembley Stadium, click to enlarge.
Pic. 31 View from the Sky Garden towards the Pancras International rail station and Stanmore Hill (152m.a.s.l.) – 3rd the highest hill in the London area, Chiltern Hills beyond, click to enlarge.
Pic. 32 View towards the Barbican block of flats and Hampstead Hill (137m.a.s.l) – one of the highest hills in the London Area with Kenwood House. Beyond Mill Hill near Edgware with the National Institute of Medical Research, click to enlarge.
Pic. 33 View towards the Barbican block of flats with Holloway and Highgate districts beyond, click to enlarge.
Pic. 34 View from the Sky Garden on the Ebiquity building and towards the Emirates stadium and Alexandra Palace, click to enlarge.
Pic. 35 Zoom from the Walkie Talkie building on the Emirates (Arsenal) football stadium and Alexandra Palace beyond, see the original image.
Mariusz Krukar
Links:
- Places with the best view of London and everything that you need to know about visiting these places.
- The Sky Garden main page
- Best views of London
- Telegraph.co.uk: London with rooftop restaurants and restaurants with views
- Lbc.co.uk: 10 views of London cheaper than The Shard
- 10 things to know about visiting the Sky Garden
- Timeout.com: London restaurants with the best views
- Timeout.com: Eight places to see incredible views of the London skyline for free
- Cityam.com: Walkie Talkie Sky Garden how to book visit stunning park views across London
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