Clarendon 2016 Burleigh Mansions | Page 4

Local Area

Right in the heart of London, with all the hustle and bustle of city life,
Charing Cross Road has more or less everything on its doorstep and offers
a wide range of opportunities for enjoyment. Along the road is Chinatown,
full of restaurants and little shops selling Chinese spices and foods.
Leicester Square is a stone’s throw away with cinemas featuring the latest
© Visit London Images/Big foto/london-pictures.com

blockbusters, more restaurants - and of course sparrows!
London’s Theatreland is within easy walking distance, as is Trafalgar Square,
Covent Garden, the Royal Opera House and much, much more. It’s a really
lively area to live in.
Charing Cross Road was once renowned for its numerous secondhand
bookshops. For book lovers, a few of these still survive in Cecil Court - turn
right out of Burleigh Mansions and it is the first turning on your right.
Number 84 became famous in the 1970s when the delightful
correspondence between New Yorker Helene Hanff and the staff of the
bookshop Marks & Co. was published as a book entitled - no surprise - ’84,
Charing Cross Road’.
So how did Charing Cross get its name?
When Queen Eleanor died in Nottinghamshire in 1290, her husband
King Edward I arranged for her body to be brought to London and buried
at Westminster Abbey. Wherever her coffin was set down for the night a
stone cross was erected. There were 12 in all. The final cross was placed
somewhere in Whitehall, but destroyed in the 17th century. A new cross
was made in the 1860s; it stands outside the main entrance to Charing
Cross Station.

Covent Garden © London on View

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