The View From the Shard at Sunset

I waited until the absolute last night (Thursday night) I could possibly go to the top (well, almost) of The Shard, as I'm busy until I leave back home for Chicago on Monday evening. There was a wonderful sunset that I missed just earlier this week so I was crossing my fingers for another, which isn't too likely in London. Well, I got lucky. Thursday was cloudy all day but it cleared up just in time for the sunset, which is when I booked to go up.

It slipped my mind to bring my polarizer to reduce some glare on the windows, which really bummed me out, but I got good enough pictures. it's noticeable in a few frames.

It was really an experience getting up to the top. First you walk through security (just like at the airport), metal detector and xray for items, and then several staff keep you on route to the elevators. You take that elevator to the 38th floor and that takes less than 20 seconds. Then you walk around the corner, directed by a bunch of people again, on to another elevator to take you up the remaining 30 floors. This is the lower level deck on floor 68, but you can walk up stairs to the 72nd floor, where there is no ceiling. I think there were about 5-10 additional levels, but the public aren't allowed up there. The Shard is like a pyramid at the top, where it gets skinnier, and the only structure above you were those levels.

I'm going to try something new and make the pictures bigger, I think it will look nicer, especially with these. The pictures are in chronological order.

The Shard is London's tallest building, at 1,012 feet.