Greenwich Wheel

The Greenwich Wheel that gave visitors excellent views across Greenwich over the Summer was yesterday taken down. Simon Starr’s excellent Cutty Sark Webcam was brilliantly positioned to capture the Wheel coming down, so here’s a couple of image grabs which he kindly gave permission for me to use that show exactly how it happened.

Image one shows the wheel on Sunday – before work started on bringing it down.

By 09.57 on Tuesday, the pods have been taken off.

A pigeon swoops past the webcam – nice action shot!

It can be seen now that a segment has been removed and it’s starting to look like Pacman munching on those trees.

By 5pm, it’s well over half way down and has been turned around too.

And today, the Greenwich Wheel is gone – will it be back next year?

This summer has seen the arrival of a feature on the Greenwich riverside that has offered views to match those of the London Eye. The Greenwich Wheel can take you sixty metres in to the sky, and apparently on a clear day you can see up to 25 miles into the distance.

With the Wheel only there until 28th September, I thought I better go along and have a look before it disappeared. My first observation was that it was remarkably quiet. Ok, summer is pretty much over now and the kid’s are back at school, but even so the thing was pretty empty with I think two people on it before I got there, and then when I boarded it was just me and a friend, and another guy in the pod behind us. It costs £7 for an adult and £4.50 for kids. The wheel actually moves pretty speedily, but you get a good couple of rotations and the ride lasts for ten minutes or so.

The views were excellent, with brilliant vistas across Greenwich Park, the Royal Navy College and Canary Wharf in the other direction. When you get off, you can buy a photo of yourself in the pod for some extortionate amount, so best of taking your own camera. If you haven’t been yet, definitely worth popping along and giving it a go. It’s open between 10am and 10pm until Sept 28th.