Description
Greenwich Park is the hilly Royal Park in southeast London that climbs from the river to the Royal Observatory: 74 hectares of lawns, old trees and flower gardens, crossed by the Prime Meridian and topped by one of the great views of London.
The steep walk uphill ends at the statue of General Wolfe, beside the Observatory. From there the view takes in the former Greenwich Hospital, the Thames, the towers of Canary Wharf and the City.
On the upper level are a flower garden with a duck pond and a rose garden, an avenue of cherry trees famous for its spring blossom, 17th-century sweet chestnuts with twisting trunks and "The Wilderness", an enclosure for deer. Roman remains and Anglo-Saxon burial mounds hide in the grass.
It was the first Royal Park to be enclosed, in 1433, and Henry VIII hunted deer here. In 1894 a French anarchist died when his bomb went off early near the Observatory, an episode that inspired Joseph Conrad's "The Secret Agent".
The steep walk uphill ends at the statue of General Wolfe, beside the Observatory. From there the view takes in the former Greenwich Hospital, the Thames, the towers of Canary Wharf and the City.
On the upper level are a flower garden with a duck pond and a rose garden, an avenue of cherry trees famous for its spring blossom, 17th-century sweet chestnuts with twisting trunks and "The Wilderness", an enclosure for deer. Roman remains and Anglo-Saxon burial mounds hide in the grass.
It was the first Royal Park to be enclosed, in 1433, and Henry VIII hunted deer here. In 1894 a French anarchist died when his bomb went off early near the Observatory, an episode that inspired Joseph Conrad's "The Secret Agent".