Well bloglets, it is September, which means summer is
officially over for another year. This might then make this weekend’s choice of
activity seem a little odd, but I refuse to let the passing of the warm weather
signal the end of my romping in the outdoors. That’s why this weekend, my right
honourable flatmates (RHFs) and I decided we would go for a good old-fashion
walk to blow (fairly literally) away the cobwebs.
It is true that, if you live in the countryside, a weekend
walk is a fairly natural thing, but must seem rather strange when one lives in
a bustling metropolis such as London. Well, the whole idea came about when RHF1
brought home The Rough Guide to Walks in
London & Southeast England. This handy little guide suggests around 40
routes, all within an hour’s train journey of London, and ranks them by
difficulty, as well as pointing out interesting sites and the best places to
eat or drink. So, we thought, since this blog is all about exploring London,
what could be better?!
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| Don't ask me to explain this one...because I can't... |
Since the day allotted for our walk promised to be bright
yet blustery, we thought we would start off with a shorter walk, fairly close
to home in good old South-East London. The route we chose started off at Bethnal
Green station and skirted along Regent’s Canal and around Limehouse Basin
to…the pub! Where else? It was –
justifiably – rated easy and should have taken us 1 hour and 20 minutes. But we
stopped for cake, and to take pictures…and just generally ambled, so we ended
up doing it in 3 hours… No judging!
There was no escaping that this was an urban walk, with an
abundance of tower blocks and frequent sights of the Shard and Canary Wharf,
but most of the route was along Regent’s Canal or the Thames and there was
plenty of greenery to be found and that, plus the sunshine, really made for a
most agreeable stroll.
One of the potential pit-stops along the way is the RaggedSchool Museum , which is dedicated to
the work of Dr Thomas Barnardo, and has very strange opening hours (if you
fancy visiting – I’d suggest you prepare in advance!). It is situated in the
school set up by Dr Barnardo in 1877 for the children of Mile End. We decided
to see a different face of Mile End, however, and went for tea at a charming
café called The Coffee Room, which I would highly recommend.
Nearer the end of the walk there is also Limehouse Basin, an
old dock which used to be used by seagoing vessels to drop off their loads to
canal barges which would transport the cargoes further up along Regent’s Canal.
It was built in 1820, but did not achieve huge commercial success until the
mid-nineteenth century. Later it became one of London’s most infamous slums, a
den of vice and sin, and the home of old Chinatown, which moved to its current
location after much of Limehouse was destroyed in the Blitz. Anyway, the Basin
was redeveloped in the 80s and is now the location of a number of fancy-pants
apartment blocks.
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| I feel like this picture makes it look as if the top of the Shard is opening some sort of portal... |
We finished our walk at The Prospect of Whitby – London’s
oldest riverside inn. It was opened in 1520, during the reign of Henry VIII,
and has been going ever since. Nice, atmospheric old pub, with gorgeous views
of the Thames, but beware! The prices are extortionate. We were going to have
dinner, but after RHF3’s pint came to £5.70, we decided takeaway at home made
more sense…
The Outandaboutfit itself is fairly straightforward –
slouchy jersey material so I looked put-together but was also extremely
comfortable, and also pearls to offset my really-rather-manky Vans with the
holes in the toes. Again I say, no judging. All black may have been a slight
oversight considering how sunny it was, but it did make me feel a great deal
more at home walking around edgy East London…
London Walk
details
Closest
Tube/Overground station = Bethnal Green at the start, Wapping Overground at the
end
Ragged School Museum
Opening Times = 10am-5pm - Wednesday and Thursday, 2pm-5pm – First Sunday of
each month
Admission Costs for
RSM = Free
