The second weekend of our London stay was the Mayor's Thames Festival, and on Saturday we got to see hundreds of participants in the Great River Race, which starts upstream at Richmond and runs for 22 miles to the Docklands below Tower Bridge. We had a great vantage point—hanging over the railings on the downstream side of the Hungerford/Jubilee Bridge. Here is the blog post that describes the day.

This page highlights just a few of the dozens of pictures I took as boats of all sizes and descriptions, crewed by all kinds of folks, slipped under our bridge on their way downstream. There are many more photos of the race in this Flickr set, which is arranged in the order the photos were taken, so you can sort of relive the race with me.

Here are some panoramic shots that give you an idea how many boats (and how many spectators—check out the crowds on the Waterloo Bridge!) took in the race on this gorgeous September afternoon. The tube-like structure with blue accents heading down to the water on the South Bank is the Festival Pier. You might be able to see from the foreshore over there that the tide is somewhat down (closer looks at the foreshore are below).

Here are a couple of closer looks at the foreshore by Festival Pier:

There were big boats and small boats in the Race:

More varieties of boats....

Even some kayaks! (See the top of the photo on the left below.) Not to mention boats needing rescue (the rescuers at the lower right were heading toward the only boat we saw tipped over; unfortunately my picture of that boat didn't come out too well)....

Many of the boats' crews entered fully into the light-hearted spirit of the affair, like these on the left with the Dutch funny hats and the guys on the right with the "Jaws" shark fin hats:

And some of the boats sported rather familiar-looking banners, sights we weren't expecting to see on the Thames:

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