I have a few ear piercings (6 to be exact). I tend to just fill them with the same style hoop earring and then, every few years or so, buy a new set of them. As I’ve found, the places which usually have the type I like are to found in areas with head shops and other vaguely (faux) alternative themes. Since the car accident, when a number of the earrings I had at the time were knocked out of my ears, I’ve just been sort of coasting along. However, I recently decided it was time to restock. So I headed to the best place I could think of in London which is Camden Town.

Camden Town is the sort of alternative center of the city. In the area around it, there are a number of huge open air markets all of which seem to sell the same goth/punk style goods. In the last 30 years, it’s exploded and, on weekends, it can be a little chaotic. The most interesting of these markets is called Camden Locks because it’s right near the Camden Lock in the canal nearby. It’s set up almost like a catacomb, winding all around the elevated rail tracks nearby. As long as you can handle the hoards of people, it’s definitely worth checking out for the variety of people trying to look alternative. For me, it mostly made me feel old, since it was overrun by teenagers with dyed hair and piercings. But I got what I needed. Anyway, here’s a little of what I saw:

This is the Camden Lock market. It’s vaguely covered and winds for a pretty good ways and, aside from lots of shops, it has a ton of Chinese and Indian fast food with pushy people behind the counters hawking their food.

Here’s a sign at the entrance. On either side of the “L” are two painted people apparently white-washing over the sign. Cute.

Here is the eponymous Camden Lock. It is part of the big ass canal system that traverses north London. There’s a foot/bike path along it and, in this particular section, a shit load of homeless folk hanging around.

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 17th, 2007 at 8:05 am and is filed under Life Abroad, London, Photos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.