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Dr. Johnson was a celebrated writer, journalist, literary critic, and wit. He published his famous annotated Shakespeare in 1765, and his wonderful "Lives of the Poets" in 1780.

Many of the most famous quotations in the English language are his - "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." When discussing a proposed second marriage, he described it as "The triumph of hope over experience." He was dismissive of self-styled literary patrons - "Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, encumbers him with help?" Of all his achievements, the greatest was, perhaps, the dictionary he wrote and published with but 6 assistants - fixing the meaning and spelling of many previously variable words. Even in the dictionary, however, he could not altogether restrain himself - he said that "Dictionaries are like watches: the worst is better than none, and the best cannot be expected to go quite true."

He did not hesitate to put down those he felt were being illogical - he said about the American Declaration of Independence that "How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of Negroes?" He died in 1784, and is buried at Westminster Abbey - a Londoner by choice.

The house itself is a beautiful, Georgian townhouse, elegantly decorated in the style of the man himself. There are two main rooms downstairs, three on the first floor, and a low-ceilinged attic room at the top - all are beautifully proportioned and decorated in the style of his time, and have some of his possessions and publications on view.

I first visited the house in 1999, when my parents, life-long admirers of Dr. Johnson, decided to hold their 25th wedding anniversary party in the house, which is hired out for functions in the evenings, and is the perfect place for such a gathering. It must be said, however, that Boswell reported that Dr. Johnson was not a fan of my father's profession - 'he did not care to speak ill of any man behind his back, but he believed the gentleman was an attorney'.

Gough Square is about equidistant from Temple (Circle + District Lines), Chancery Lane (Central Line), and Blackfriars (Circle + District Lines) tube stations, just north of Fleet Street. The museum is open from Monday to Saturday, 11am - 5.30pm.

The biggest is the Camden Stables, once a horse hospital for horses injured while working on the canals. Now it's mostly a clothes market, with hundreds of stalls and small permanent shops. A lot of the clothes are cheap Indian or Nepalese imports, but there are also some very interesting designers selling their own work - it's a great place to come for reasonably priced, original stuff. There's also lots of food stalls, selling (actually quite expensive, often) hot dogs, fruit on sticks, etc. In addition, there are also a number of very interesting stalls selling wooden things – I got a lovely wooden chess board here for my brother about a year ago, which is inlaid with different types of wood and beautifully made. It cost about £50 – not cheap, but for something so well-made, a bargain. The market is open every day, although there are more stalls at the weekends.

Camden Lock is a lovely site for a market – it runs along the Regent’s Canal, and you can get on a boat for a quick trip up and down here, if you like. The market is arranged over a series of open courtyards, and a hall. The hall is beautiful – there is the main downstairs part on the ground floor, and then a balcony around the first floor with more stalls and shops. There is a huge variety of stuff sold in this market – a lot of books, some art work and photography, aromatherapy, cheap clothes, cheap jewellery. You can get your fortune or horoscope told, and get henna tattoos done. It’s a fun, happening place. The market is open every day, although there are more stalls at the weekends.

To get to the markets, you can take a bus up to Camden from Holborn, Euston, Trafalgar Square, etc, or take the tube. At weekends, Camden Town tube is exit only, owing to pressure of numbers, so you can get off the tube here but not get back on. To travel out of the area, walk to Chalk Farm tube (slightly to the north of the markets) or Mornington Crescent (slightly to the south.) All of these are on the Northern Line. You can also travel by mainline train to Camden station. Driving is a very bad idea – parking is scarce and expensive, and there are so many people on the road it doesn’t feel much fun to drive through them!

Inverness Market is different from the others in Camden – it sells pretty much only fruit and veg. The produce on sale is of a high quality, and there’s a massive choice – if it grows in soil, or on a tree, you can buy it there! There are also a number of small shops selling good, rare, or expensive foods – organic honey, fine cheeses, home-cured meats – that type of thing. A very interesting place to visit.

The Camden Canal market isn’t one I know well – I’ve only popped in there once. There seem to be quite a lot of exotic take-away stalls, including a great noodle bar one I can recommend. There is also the usual mix of cheap imported clothes and jewellry. I believe this place is only open at the weekend.

Buck Street Market, which is open every day, sells mostly clothes. There is a mixture of stuff available here – most of the stalls sell 5 pound polyester tops in bright colours, cheap Nike tops, wrap-around skirts, etc, but there’s also some much more unusual stuff. There are a few people selling unique stuff they’ve designed themselves, often very eclectic and interesting. I’ve got a shirt I bought from here which is blue silk, with a white lace over-shirt attached – it’s beautiful and well-made, and very unusual. There are also a couple of shops selling vintage clothes – 50s leather jackets, 20s dress shirts and the like, which are fun to browse through.

To get to the markets, you can take a bus up to Camden from Holborn, Euston, Trafalgar Square, etc, or take the tube. At weekends, Camden Town tube is exit only, owing to pressure of numbers, so you can get off the tube here but not get back on. To travel out of the area, walk to Chalk Farm tube (slightly to the north of the markets) or Mornington Crescent (slightly to the south.) All of these are on the Northern Line. You can also travel by mainline train to Camden station. Driving is a very bad idea – parking is scarce and expensive, and there are so many people on the road it doesn’t feel much fun to drive through them!

At the start of the Second World War, HMS Belfast was part of the fleet operating out of Scarpa Flow, trying to block Germany’s ports. She was then attacked by a submarine, and spent several years being overhauled before being put back into service, as an escort for convoys of merchant ships heading for the beleagued Soviet Union. The ship took part in the D-Day landings in Normandy. After the end of the war in Europe, the ship was sent to the Far East, where it later took part in the Korean War. During her active lifetime she sailed nearly half a million miles.

Today the ship is berthed just off Tooley Street, on the south side of the river near Tower Bridge. The tour of the boat takes you round the quarter-deck, with a wooden board showing the battles the ship fought in, and the gun placements, which show the ship’s formidable fire-power. I found the engine rooms very interesting – I took my brother here one Easter holiday, and he also found the vast, steam-powered systems fascinating. The tour explains how the ship was powered, and how the whole thing worked. You can also see the bridge, the officers’ and enlisted men’s living areas, and the eating rooms – and see what a crowded environment it was to live in!

The tour is very good, and the whole ship is set out with interesting maps, living objects, and navigational displays to show you how it worked. Little boys sick of churches and art galleries will love this place – and so will their parents!

Adults’ tickets are £5.40, children come in free, and OAPs and students pay £4. The nearest tube stops are Tower Hill (District and Circle lines) and London Bridge (Northern line). The ship’s open 10am to 6pm in summer, and closes an hour earlier in the winter.

The City is the original London town – and until the Middle Ages, the walls around it contained the whole city. Westminster was a separate city, and the ground between, such as Holborn, and Bloomsbury, was not built up. St. Martin-in-the-Fields church by Trafalgar Square is so called because when it was built, it was indeed in fields!

The city was two-thirds destroyed in the Great Fire of London of 1666, which wiped out the old, densely built, timber structures of the time. Fires were common in such a flammable city, and the Mayor is reported to have said, when woken to be told of this fire, that "a woman could piss it out". Three days later, when the fire was finally out, he may have changed his mind.

After the fire the city was rebuilt, not, as Christopher Wren had wanted, on a grand new street plan, but along original lines. St. Paul’s Cathedral, with its great dome and wonderful serenity, dates from the reconstruction. The rebuilding method chosen means that the streets in the city are still often the same shape and name as they were 900 years ago – Cheapside, meaning marketplace, Poultry, Old Jewry, or Paternoster Row, for example, are all named after trades and markets.

The old walls of the city are still visible in places, such as the aptly named London Wall. These date from Roman times, and the modern names of Aldgate, Cripplegate, Ludgate, and Moorgate show where the entrances into London through these walls were.

To rule the country, it was always necessary to rule London. William the Conqueror built the Tower of London next to it, and Kings have placated and given into the city over the last 9 centuries. London supported Parliament in the Civil War – and Charles I lost his head.

When King Richard the Lionheart was off fighting his battles in Jerusalem, his younger brother John, later King himself, allowed the merchants in the city to form a society. When he was King, in 1215, he allowed them to elect a mayor, but demanded that the mayor come from the city to Westminster every year when elected to pay homage to the monarch. The present Lord Mayor’s show is the continuation of that – the newly-elected Mayor makes his way from the City of London to the City of Westminster to swear his allegiance. He is accompanied by worthies of the City – made up of the City police, and Livery companies, for the most part. The livery companies are like very early trade unions in origin; groups of tradesmen who formed companies to regulate apprenticeships, support other tradesmen, etc. They still survive today, although more as dining and charity organisations that anything else. They also still have their old uniforms – so the show features many ruffles, breaches, and sparkly shoes.

My father used to bring me to the show every year when I was a child. It starts just after 11am, but we used to bag our places on the embankment along the Thames about 9am. The mayor, guarded by men marching in read coats and frills carrying pikes, makes his way in his gorgeous coach to the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand, where he goes inside and swears his oath to the Master of the Rolls and the Lord Chief Justice. (Important judges, and representatives of the Queen.) He then wends his way back slowly to the City, accompanied by his vast marching entourage.

Later, after dark (about 5pm), he sets off a firework display on the Thames, which can be seen from some distance – this year we could see it from our flat a mile or so north of Fleet Street.