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Map of the area surrounding Buckingham Palace. Yellow line indicates the itinerary used for the photo gallery.

The Rubens at the Palace (39 Buckingham Palace Road London SW1W 0PS ) is one of the hotels very close to Buckingham Palace. This is a four-star hotel with a good reputation for its service. Its Executive King Room is £289.00 (excluding VAT, prices 2010)

Entrance to 41 Hotel, 41 Buckingham Palace Road, London, SW1W 0PS. This 5-star hotel is actually next door from The Rubens. It belongs to The Red Carnation, the same chain that owns The Rubens and more expensive. Its Executive King Room is £345.00 (excluding VAT, prices 2010). The hotel shares some services with The Rubens. In fact, 41 Hotel guests can add bills from The Rubens to their 41 hotel account.

About our itinerary - we start near Victoria Station, well-known spot in London, and take Buckingham Palace Road and start moving NE (which is on the right side of the photo). The Buckingham Palace will be on your left side, and you will pass various buildings that belong to the palace. This one houses the Royal Mews. It is opened to public March - October and provides a unique opportunity to see the transport for the Royal Family by both, horse-drawn carriages and motor cars

The Royal Mews shop. I should say that the Royal family is pretty much into tourist souvenir business, and you find many places where you can exchange your money for an authorized piece of something that will remind of your visit to London.

Buckingham Palace Shop - as I just said, plenty of places to help keep Royal vaults full.

Buckingham Palace Road is rather boring and uneventful. Just look at this long Royal fence of the left side of the picture. The Road can also be windy and cold. So, just keep going towards main gates at Buckingham Palace.

While we are getting closer to the visitor entrance to palace premises opened for public, this entrance is to the The Queen’s Gallery shop (yes, another shop). The Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace is a permanent space dedicated to changing exhibitions of items from the Royal Collection.

Buckingham Gate street is a continuation of Buckingham Palace Road. It turns right, but our destination is a huge square (in the center of the photo) in front of Buckingham Palace.

Crowd in front of Buckingham Palace Ticket Office and The State Rooms, visitor entrance. The State Rooms are used by The Queen and Members of the Royal Family to receive and entertain guests on official occasions. In August and September when The Queen makes her annual visit to Scotland, the Palace's 19 state rooms are open to visitors.

This sign tells us that Buckingham Palace is a protected site under Section 128 of the Serious Organized Crime and Police Act 2005. Trespass on this site is a criminal offence.

Buckingham Gate street turns to the right, and we are entering a large square in front of Buckingham Palace. It appears that this square is actually called Queen's Gardens though it is all paved and stone. St. James's Park is in the bakcground.

The south-east wing of the palace as seen from the Buckingham Gate street.

Here is the map you have already seen - this is to remind you our itinerary.

Map of the area surrounding Buckingham Palace. Yellow line indicates the itinerary used for the photo gallery.

Buckingham Palace, the principal façade or the East Front constructed by Edward Blore and completed in 1850. It was redesigned in 1913 by Sir Aston Webb.

The Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom is the official coat of arms of the British monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II officially known as her Arms of Dominion. The shield in its first and fourth quarters depicts the three passant guardant lions of England; the rampant lion and double tressure fleury-counter-fleury of Scotland are in the second quadrant; and in the third, a harp for Ireland. The dexter supporter is a crowned English lion; the sinister, a Scottish unicorn. The translation of two mottos are: &qout;God and my right&qout; (English monarchs), and &qout;Shamed be he who thinks ill of it&qout; (Order of the Garter, the oldest national order of knighthood)

The must be one hell of a key (but I have to confess - this keyhole belongs to the Green Park gates we will see soon)

Police guarding the car entrance to the inner court of the Buckingham Palace. You can see warning signs and a part of the road blocking mechanism.

On this photo a couple of very important and serious people are showing their credentials to guards before entering the Palace.

The principal (East front) façade of the Buckingham Palace. It was completed in 1850, and remodelled to its present form in 1913.

The Buckingham Palace as seen from The Mall. The Victoria Memorial is in front of the palace.

View from the Buckingham Palace on to The Mall, the road running from Buckingham Palace to Trafalgar Square. It is closed to traffic on Sundays and public holidays, and on ceremonial occasions.

The Victoria Memorial was created by sculptor Sir Thomas Brock in 1911 and erected in front of the main gates at Buckingham Palace.

The Victoria Memorial surround is a walled area with steps to the center. Sculptures of bronze lions and men with torches guard either side of these stairways. The surround also includes large fountain basins.

The Victoria Memorial is dedicated to Queen Victoria, the longest reigning monarch in British history. The Victoria Memorial, more than 80 feet high and four-meter statue of Queen Victoria, is constructed with 2,300 tons of marble.

One of several bronze statues on The Victoria Memorial surround.

Flowers in front of St. James's Park, a 23 hectare (58 acre) area, the oldest of the Royal Parks of London. The park is gorgeous with man-made but naturally-shaped lake and romantic winding pathways.

A nice cozy place in St. James's park with plenty of plants landscaped in natural, typical for English gardens ways

The eastern part of the St. James's Park.

It is guaranteed that sooner or later you will horses on streets and squares surrounding the Buckingham Palace. Actually, if you know what I am talking about you will feel their presence even before you see them. If you do not know, I can tell you - it is the smell of manure.

More horses - a unit of Horse Guards on the Constitution Hill heading to The Horse Guards building (Whitehall area), the headquarters of the Household cavalry. Interestingly, as you can see on the picture, the unit is accompanied by police. The Buckingham Palace is on the left side.

Close-up on troopers mounted on horses. By looking at their uniform (tunic, plume and collar colors ), I can say that they are from The Life Guards, a senior regiment of the British Army. With the Blues and Royals they make up the Household Cavalry, a UK most elite military formation with traditions dating from 1660.

Entrance to The Green Park, another Royal Park in London. It covers 19 hectares (47 acres), and lies between London's Hyde Park and St. James's Park. Looking at the picture, the Buckingham Palace is on the left side.

Opposite to its neighboring parks, The Green Park has no lakes, no buildings and few monuments. The park consists entirely of wooded meadows loved by Londoners and tourists alike. On this picture, there is a group people practicing Tai chi chuan, a form of Chinese martial art often practiced for health reasons.

This is Constitution Hill - a road connecting the western end of The Mall (just in front of Buckingham Palace) with Hyde Park Corner. The photo shows the road in the direction of Hyde Park. Thus, the Buckingham Palace and its Gardens are on the left side and Green Park is on the right. The word Hill can hardly be used to characterize the location; there is a small slope but the road looks flat.

That's the wall surrounding the Buckingham Palace and its Gardens along the Constitution Hill road on its left side. Not pleasant and I would say grim.

The western end of Constitution Hill. In the background you can the Wellington Arch at Hyde Park Corner. But nowadays, the arch stands at the centre of a busy traffic island and its association with Constitution Hill is an illusion.

If you think this picture is about Wellington Arch, you are wrong. Click on image to enlarge it and you will see a separate light that is supposed to control traffic of people on horses. If for Londoners this is something very familiar, for most people, it is a opportunity to experience horse civilization for the first time.

This is a nice map that shows the layout of Hyde Park Corner and adjacent street and landmarks.

Hyde Park Corner is a place where several major arteries in central London come together.

One of the major London streets is Piccadilly - it runs from Hyde Park Corner in the west to Piccadilly Circus in the east. This image shows Piccadilly at its western end.

Wellington Arch (also Constitution Arch or Green Park Arch) is a triumphal arch located to the south of Hyde Park on a traffic island. The Wellington Arch was finished in 1830 and was often perceived at the time as a grand entrance into central London. The arch is hollow inside and with three floors of exhibits now open to public. Terraces on both sides of the top of the arch are also open to visitors.

What is this? Yes, it' a manure. Usual picture at this side of London. Not a surprised then that the air is filled with the strong smell of horses.

Hyde Park map - The Hyde Park Corner is located at the right side of the map at its bottom.

Since our goal is to explore areas around Buckingham Palace, any substantial excursion into Hyde Park would be a serious distraction. However, just a peek would not hurt. Here is what you can find at the Rose Garden - roses, shrubs and herbaceous plants carefully selected for all-year color and scent.

The Serpentine Bar & Kitchen restaurant is located next to the Serpentine lake in Hyde Park. Food is not great, but due to its prime location, the restaurant is a popular place for many people to spend time.

Another view on The Serpentine Bar & Kitchen restaurant in Hype Park, London. Indeed, it is difficult to find better place to stay on a sunny London day.

Serene Serpentine lake in Hyde Park, London. Beautiful, tranquil and peaceful - all I can say.

Bikers in Hyde Park, London

View on Knightsbridge road running along the south side of Hyde Park, west from Hyde Park Corner. The district is known as a highly expensive residential area, and for many upscale department stores like Harrods and Harvey Nichols as well as many designer outlets.

Back to Hype Park Corner and its traffic island. On this picture you can see The Royal Artillery Memorial dedicated (1925) to casualties in the British Royal Regiment of Artillery in World War I.

The Royal Artillery Memorial (Hyde Park Corner) - one of four bronze figures of artillery soldiers on the memorial as part of scenes reflecting the reality of war. The monument has a realist approach in its style contrary to the idealized art of other sculptors of the time.

A smaller equestrian statue of Wellington in Hyde Park Corner, London.

Despite its relatively limited area, the traffic island in Hyde Park Corner, has six large memorials (including Wellington Arch). This one is dedicated to New Zealanders killed in the First and Second World Wars.

New Zealand memorial consists of 16 cross-shaped vertical bronze sculptures, each adorned with text, images that evoke the theme of the memorial. This text on this sculpture reads &qout;poppies with stems so slender they were hardly visible swayed in a gentle breeze like crimson butterflies. Big guns away in the distance near Gaza kept up a constant rumble.&qout;

Another memorial at Hyde Park Corner - The Australian War Memorial (unveiled in 2003) is a war memorial to the 102,000 Australian killed during the First and Second World Wars.

The Australian War Memorial has been designed as a curved wall of grey-green West Australian granite, with the names of battles in which Australia was involved. The following inscription is on the memorial plate: &qout;The place names record the origins of Australian servicemen and women many of whom were born in the United Kingdom and elsewhere. Each is a reminder of the impact of was on families and communities. The flow of water over these names evokes memories of service, suffering and sacrifice.&qout;

It's time to move on. We use underpass to leave the Hyde Park Corner traffic island and start moving back to where we started, Victoria Station.

You can learn something about history of London (and England) if you take time to look at walls in the underpass.

This is Grosvenor Place - a street in London, running from Hyde Park Corner down the west side of Buckingham Palace gardens (on the left side of the picture), and joining Grosvenor Gardens, which links it to Victoria railway station.

Grosvenor Place, with minor exceptions, is not an interesting place. The wall of the Buckingham Palace garden is as ugly as it is in any other area. So, enjoy the richness of these facades of buildings with offices and apartments.

Another example of the architectural style common to many buildings in Grosvenor Place in London.

This where Grosvenor Places (on the left side of the picture) crosses Grosvenor Garden (not really visible on the photo). The street in the center-right of the photo is called Beeston Place.

If there is anything notable about Beeston Place, that will be The Goring Hotel, one of the best in London.

At this point we are very close to the end of our tour around The Buckingham Palace and its Garden. This picture gives you an idea of cityscape near Victoria Station. By the way, this is Buckingham Palace Road in the direction from the Buckingham Palace.

London Victoria Station, entrance.

The Shakespeare pub (corner Buckingham Palace Road and Terminus Place). It is just a pub; nothing remarkable about it.

The Duke of York pub (another one near Victoria Station with horrible food). The Victoria Palace Theater is on the right side of the photo.

Traffic accident on Victoria Street.

Little Ben - a cast iron miniature clock tower at the intersection of Vauxhall Bridge Road and Victoria Street, in Westminster, London. Its design mimics Big Ben at the Palace of Westminster. According to the inscription on the clock, it is &qout;offered as a gesture of Franco-British friendship... My hands you may retard or may advance my heart beats true for England as for France.&qout;

Map of the area surrounding Buckingham Palace. Yellow line indicates the itinerary used for the photo gallery.