It’s not easy taking pictures through aircraft windows. The sun invariably mucks up the window and gets in the way, but when I finally got around to downloading the pictures from one of the two cameras I took off on my travels this month, I found the pictures of London I’d taken from the plane.

The one above, taken from just to the west of Heathrow, clearly shows the Thames running from the coast right through the centre of the capital.

The estuary, at Southend, is at the top of the picture, where it gets lost in the clouds on the horizon, before sweeping in towards the camera, dividing Essex, to the left of the picture, and Kent to the right. It then does a big loop to the right, to enclose London Docklands. At the narrowest point of that loop - where it almost closes up to the north (on the left of the swoop as you look at it here) is Canary Wharf, home to Europe’s tallest buildings. If they weren’t there you’d just be able to see the Dome on the opposite bank.

As the river continues towards the plane it narrows slightly but, more significantly, turns to the right (south) again to cut off Westminster (Parliament) from the West End, then level out before heading more severely than before south towards Battersea and the posher end of the commuter belt.

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