Ally Pally

Alexandra Palace is a...well, it's hard to explain exactly what it is...in North London.  It was built in 1873 and promptly burned to the ground less than three weeks after it opened.  It has been a concert hall featuring The Grateful Dead, Led Zepplin, Pink Floyd, and the Kinks.  It currently houses an ice skating rink, a restaurant, and remains a concert hall.  For the 2012 Olympics, it will house the Dutch Olympic team, presumably on the ice rink.  Ally Pally is surrounded by a large park that includes a boating lake.

 A shining city on a hill..

 Iconic BBC broadcasting aerial.  Still in use (has been featured in Dr. Who).  The tower was used in WWII to broadcast jamming signals to the German bombers.  It it said that these jamming signals caused 75% of German raids to be unsuccessful.

 Pretty good view of central London

 Ummm...ok

 "Ven papa was captured by de British, dey kept him prisoner at a real palace!"

 Rose window was blown out by a German bomb during WWII.

 South entrance

 South entrance

 Collonnade

 So let's go inside to the Palm Court.

 Not quite the Palm Court of the Ritz, but has it's own charm.

 A Palm Court requires palms.  So here they are.

 2) These columns are:
a) Doric
b) Ionic
c) Fine Corinthian Leather

 Naturally there must be a sphinx

 Emergency backup sphinx

 That's really an impressive barrel vault

 It's nickname is the People's Palace, which was to be the original name.  It eventually took it's name from Princess Alexandra (the Denmark one), who was married to King Edward VII and was the mother of George V.

Nessie boats on the lake.