Ever since Homegame, I've struggled to find a purpose for some things. Work in particular has suffered - the pointlessness and the lack of progress suddenly foregrounded, and my part in the whole process left exposed by a bunch of colleagues who are downright suspicious of my political motives. So I found this morning's trip approaching at alarming speed, with little or no planning. I'd booked some tickets to London because it had been a while since I'd wandered around up there. The original plan had been to give the Oyster Card some exercise and flit about the place, but I was anxious, irritable and distracted and decided that instead, some wandering away from the crowds might be necessary.
And so, after a pleasantly distracting journey to Paddington I found myself on a bus heading for the City. It was quiet, still just before 9:00am and the streets were only just beginning to fill with the bleary eyed tourists in the West End. As the bus filled and emptied I wondered about where to head. A coffee shop on New Bridge Street, remembered from almost a decade ago beckoned. I hopped off at an almost abandoned Ludgate Circus and made my way to the shop. A pleasant enough time was had thinking, writing and drinking coffee while I also planned my next move. The plan was that I didn't have one. I'd looked at all sorts of means of getting east, into the contested, slightly disconcerting areas which reflected my mood. Not finding a direct enough means, I set out walking east. I picnicked in Trinity Gardens, watching the groups of tourists following their professionally patient guides, occasionally straying off-piste to get their photograph taken leaping around inappropriately in a memorial to the war dead. I hid my disgust along with my empty Tesco bag and headed further east, over The Minories and into Cable Street. It had been a while since I'd been this way, and whilst little changed in some senses, I could feel an edge to the stares of the Asian men running car repair businesses as I headed by St. George in the East and pressed on. Huge drops of rain were falling now, and only the shadow footprint of the huge concrete housing blocks was providing any sort of shelter now.
At Shadwell I headed underground, using the spacious new entrance hall to the East London Line. Below it was cool and still, the tight platforms close to the tunnel mouth. I didn't have to wait long for a northbound train, and decided to head for Canonbury and thence to Stratford. It was interesting to see how the new link at Dalston Junction was now just assumed as part of the network - like it had always been there. Londoners adapt to their transport network quickly it seems. At Stratford, the chaos of the busy station contrasted oddly with the stillness of the building site. The hulk of Westfield almost finished, and the Olympic Park a little too far away to be heard. An entrance from the underpass has opened up to the new shopping centre but isn't yet used - soon it will be the busiest way in or out of the station no doubt. How long before this line, linking Shepherd's Bush and Stratford becomes sponsored? The Westfield Line has a certain privatised ring to it. Against my usual instinct I exited the station into the morass of people milling in the forecourt. People pressed flyers into my hand - clubs, jeans for sale, god - all the usual stuff. I struggled over to the bus station and negotiated a knot of PCSOs who seemed to be setting up an unofficial roadblock, to reach my stop.
My plan from here had firmed up in my mind, but the practicalities were still a little unresolved. A bus to Barking would avoid all sorts of doubling back and complications, and would get me lined up to do the GOBLIN route, cruelly curtailed by failed trains on the last attempt. The bus seethed with people, arcing between Stratford and Barking via East Ham, with seemingly endless streets of victorian terraces in between. It was good to see this zone - and it fitted an observation I'd made earlier about the Tube Map. On the map, Harry Beck compressed geography to fit - so areas with lots of stations are expanded to show clarity, while long empty stretches are condensed into mere inches of blankness. I figured we do the same with out mental maps of cities. The journey I was taking now was just such a blank zone - but by doing this bus journey I was expanding it into it's real proportions. My thoughts were disturbed by arrival in Barking town centre. A mess of traffic islands and confusion, which we negotiated until the station appeared. As I stepped off the bus, thick blobs of summer rain began to fall. I dashed downstairs onto a waiting Gospel Oak train, settling into it's pleasantly air-conditioned cocoon.
A swift run over the rooftops brought me to hot and humid Gospel Oak. I changed here for a hop to Willesden Junction, then a slow trundle north to Harrow and Wealdstone. It's an oft repeated journey which gets me back into Central London via a route I love. I pass much of railway interest, and always seem to note new things. This time, I wandered in Harrow a little, finding a plaque to commemorate where Pete Townsend first smashed his guitar when The Who played the railway hotel in 1964. The unofficial rock'n'roll tour continued later when, hopping off the bus at Edgware Road to walk to Paddington, I discovered "The Joe Strummer Underpass". It's these trivial but surprising finds which make these trips so interesting. I walked back to Paddington via a detour into the privatised space around the Grand Union Canal basin. I'd been reading Anna Minton's "Ground Control" and it was all making an eerie, worrying kind of sense. I defiantly took some pictures of a curious tubular bridge before wandering back to the station in a tremendous summer shower. As everyone rushed for cover or fumbled with brollies, I enjoyed the cool shock of rain on my back. It had been a strange day of tiny discoveries.
It's a rare privilege nowadays to wake up in London with time to spare. In fact it's been years since I've stayed with no pressing engagement early on, or a mad dash homewards to contemplate. So this felt a bit special. More so because I was in that liminal zone between Clerkenwell and Bloomsbury, the City Widened Lines rumbling just feet beneath me - and by definition the Fleet River not far away in it's anonymous culvert. It was also shaping up to be a bright cold day - the best kind for wandering around the city. I started by retracing my steps to Exmouth Market to survey the devastation I'd witness briefly on Friday night. Regeneration has wreaked a selective kind of havoc here - some buildings remain much as I remember them, shopfronts re-used by new sushi bars and boutique bakeries. Others have developed new, modern frontages with wide doors opening onto the cafe culture outside. There was much less sunday morning detritus than I recall too. However the great loss, the Sandwich Bar wedged into the awkward angle of Tysoe Street had definitely gone. Disappeared behind a hoarding advertising the very regenerative efforts which had swept it away. A union flag still draped in the upper window defiantly. I remember writing about the imagined tribulations of the attractive but always frowning foreign owner as I watched her from across the street in Starbucks, feeling guilty I wasn't spending my money in her establishment. Perhaps too many of us did that?
I pressed on into Clerkenwell Close. Here little has changed, and only the lingering afterburn of last night's chargrilling reminded me just how much this place has transformed into a destination for an evening out. When I last padded the streets, this was beginning - Clerkenwell had undergone its most recent shift from abandoned commercial zone into loft-living and media industry offices. Now it's shifting again it seems. This bothered me less, because this has always been a centre of change - a swirling eddy of people coming into the city and others being thrown out to the suburbs. I wanted to see how the reworking of Farringdon Station was affecting the landscape too, and I was perhaps unprepared for the extent of this. The western side of Turnmill Street was an endless hoarding behind which TfL were working their magic, a new entrance to the railway taking shape slowly. Turning into Cowcross Street, I noticed the entire beautifully tiled building which mirrored the station had disappeared. A new, oddly nude view across the gulf of the track had appeared. The station building remained, dwarfed by the portacabins and temporary structures around the new buildings. There was an access, but it was clogged with builders starting work for the day. I headed for more coffee to contemplate this odd rip in my memory of the area.
Further retracing my steps I decided to head for Euston via Theobalds Road and a walk across Bloomsbury's strange boundary lands. Along Lambs Conduit Street I negotiated clumps of tourists, unceremoniously turfed out of their accommodation at check-out time and wandering with their luggage, attempting sight-seeing where there are few sights of note in their guidebooks. For my part, the walk beside the Foundling Hospital and into Marchmont Street was full of familiar and unchanged sights. The street awake and busy on a Sunday morning in all its multicultural strangeness and incongruous comfort. Passing the inexplicably plush new UNISON building I entered a flustered and busy Euston Station concourse. I had a pleasurable afternoon spin up the West Coast to look forward too, but these downtrodden travellers appeared to want to be anywhere but here. Once again I felt a little guilty to be at ease against the tide.
Today wasn't a day I'd given much thought to until late last week. A chance to meet up with a friend made sense of the cheap tickets I'd got to London on the back of being a season ticket holder. However, this wasn't to be - and a fairly difficult end to the week diverted all my attention elsewhere, meaning I was going largely blind into this morning. The sudden flurry of snow yesterday afternoon had capped things wonderfully. Still, if things went wrong it wasn't an important trip. I had a vague appreciation that services were diverted via the Berks & Hants route - and on checking realised that the normal change at Weston wouldn't cut it today. The morning began early, and very very cold. I tried not to look at the temperature before venturing out because I knew it would feel worse if I was aware of it! However, it was a surprisingly dry and snowless landscape - which was of course a huge bonus. A cold wait for the mercifully well-heated first unit of the day, then a snoozy and warm trip up to Bristol.
With no pressing need to be anywhere, and no reserved train to worry about, I dawdled a bit here enjoying the cold morning in the busy station. The stock for Pathfinder's charter to Durham had just arrived - and I felt a pang of regret that I wasn't on one of these today - even if they weren't exactly the most exciting jaunts. Watched the loco run around, before the train set off on time, breakfast already being served on board. Found my own sustenance and warmed up on the 07:40 while waiting for departure.
Another very pleasant journey, with the skies clearing to a dull, purple-grey haze as the sun rose. The landscape was pleasantly white, with most roads and stations fairly clear. Aside from the planned diversion everything seemed to be running as normal here in the south, while reports of activity up north were a little more concerning. Considered next week's trip to Scotland - and wondered if it would happen at all? The weather forecast was for more cold and more snow. Arrived at Paddington and headed onto the Circle Line to get over to Liverpool Street, on something of a whim. Perhaps because of the cold it was very, very quiet. I'd half expected the huge shopping crowds to be pouring into Paddington at this, for me, fairly late arrival time of around 10:00am. From Liverpool Street, I made the short hop to Bethnal Green. I had a notion that I'd never walked into the city from this direction properly, so after negotiating my way out of the station I set off along Bethnal Green Road, navigating by the hulking towers of the city which appeared closer than I'd expected. As I passed along the street - busier, but taking Saturday in it's stride - I got to thinking about the 'big society'. In particular, how could it ever work here where if the shopfronts are any indication, the entire third sector effort is set up to kick against the state rather than work with it? Endless projects to help with immigration rights, benefit rights, housing rights. Now I've no reason to assume that Tower Hamlets council is any more discriminatory than others - in fact it's probably far, far less so. So this is about access to services, language, a perception of prejudice? This industry has sprung up around a retreating, hard to access state - and I couldn't see any easy way it could shift it's position.
The walk into the city was cold but invigorating - shorter than I expected so I pressed on, a turn around Spitalfields and Brick Lane. Favourite winter haunts, and a chance to step into a couple of shops. Again, stunned by how quiet things were. Took advantage by getting a snap of the deteriorating Shoreditch station building which I'd last visited a couple of years ago. Here's an asset which could be put to community use, but instead rots just feet from one of the busy streets in the capital.
After a quick passage through Spitalfields Market I settled in for a coffee at Liverpool Street. I felt rejuvenated by the walk, but bruised by the week I'd had. Tried to write it out whilst people-watching in the warmth of the coffee shop, but it didn't seem to work. Decided to walk further, heading south through the city and over London Bridge. Busier, but still much less frustratingly crowded than expected, I realised it was a long time since I'd passed this way on foot. Lingered on the bridge, trying to spot the wharfs and steps I'd explored on previous trips. Beside me people jostled for pictures of Tower Bridge and HMS Belfast, and I was reminded that I had the privilege of getting to wander here often and didn't have to do the headlong dash around 'the sights'. I realised too that sometimes my nose-in-the-air and eyes-on-my-feet tourism comes across as haughty or elitist, but it isn't. I'd love to share some of these wanders - but of course today hadn't quite worked out as planned.
So, the last leg of my journey - a spell at London Bridge before boarding one of the South London Line trains which describes an arc through the suburbs to Victoria. Always a pleasant journey, and with the dusk beginning it's early descent it was oddly warming to watch London starting to light up. More coffee at Victoria before heading back to Paddington. The crowds had finally materialised, and the Tube was now busy and frustrating. Not sorry to get off and onto the broad and mostly empty concourse at Paddington. An earlier train home than usual, again diverted and with an extra stop at Newbury Racecourse for those who'd braved the cold to attend the meeting there. An unsatisfactory day on many levels, but far from an unpleasant one. Sometimes its good just to get out and walk...
I left Milton Keynes early. I would probably have left earlier, but the prospect of trying to check out of the hotel and get to the station for the 04:35 wasn't pleasant. Even at a little before 07:00 the broad boulevards were empty, this part of the town apparently barely awake. In an act of defiance, I strode across the wide streets rather than using the underpasses, a hollow gesture since there were no cars around anyway, and almost no-one to witness my rebellion. However, the station was showing some signs of life, and I soon found myself heading for London on a Southern service. I dozed fitfully for much of the journey, having had little sleep and confusing dreams. I wasn't sorry to leave Milton Keynes at all, and whether it was the place, the odd situation I found myself in this weekend or a combination of the two I'm not sure - but I'm certain I don't look forward to revisiting. With the Wolverton Works Open Day cancelled, the issue of what to do this weekend had been pushed to the side of my mind by stranger events elsewhere. Given a booked trip home on the 19:00 from Paddington, a day in London seemed sensible - and given a chance to listen to the latest Hackney Podcast I was keen to head east again. So, managed to wake up enough to disembark at a deserted and chilly Kensington Olympia, and waited for what seemed like an age for a train to Willesden Junction whilst stamping my feet to wake up my legs from the crushing they'd received in the unit. At Willesden I was tantalisingly close to my first good coffee of the day from the platform kiosk, but with the next train due in a couple of minutes, decided against it. Onboard, and mercifully failure free given the recent record on this line, headed east towards Hackney Wick.
The loose plan was to get a much required and decent coffee at one of the cafes mentioned in the podcast, then to make a general progress west, through South Hackney and onwards towards Stoke Newington. I'd not planned this, and without walking boots I realised that I'd soon be experiencing some pain. However, I set out first for a quick circuit of Hackney Wick, a place in many ways in thrall of the Olympic development. The Hackney Pearl wasn't open yet and The Wick was teeming with builders, so I flagged them both feeling disconnect and unwilling to engage too much with people. Still no sign of coffee then, as I pressed on over the Eastway and briefly into Tower Hamlets, the borough which is responsible for the entirety of Victoria Park. I'd wanted to visit the park for some time - it's history appealed to me, and it is credited with some significance in the mythology of the East End too. There is however, a less formal strand of history based around the people who live near and use the park, and I hoped to get a sense of that. Things started well, and in the somewhat neglected eastern section of the park I passed a number of people who voluntarily wished me good morning in a multiplicity of accents and dialects. However, as I zigzagged roughly west, the tone of the space changed. Joggers replaced walkers, some running in packs and gossiping breathlessly while they padded the tidy, well-kept tracks in expensive sportswear. Organised exercise groups poured in through the park gates, and military orders were barked at them - I noted a perfectly pretty but rather plump young woman apparently blinking back tears at the ferocity of the verbal she'd received. I felt pity until I remembered she'd probably paid for this privilege - maybe even recommended by a friend? Pressing on, I stopped briefly at a kiosk which appeared to have been enterprisingly turned into a fully-fledged cafe offering a range of food. However, the thought of a fat man reclining with a coffee whilst around him the pretty people of East London toiled and sweated away wasn't appealing. I'd either be lynched or laughed at. So once again, I passed on the coffee.
My feet were hurting a little in my tight work shoes, and I wondered if I should really be doing this? However, I wanted to sleep tonight - and being physically tired seemed like a good way to combat the insomnia which has stalked me lately. Thinking of an uninterrupted night of sleep brought on by gentle exercise and deep lungfuls of Olympic dust was appealing, so I pressed on out of the park, and towards thundering and steaming Mare Street. A brief diversion here took me to Broadway Market. I'd not visited at a weekend before, and I wasn't quite prepared for the assault on the senses! Rich, exotic food smells mingled with expensive perfume, and hosts of young, clever and well-dressed people snaked in and out of stalls selling artisan breads, ripe cheeses and obscure dishes. The cafes spilled out onto the pavement, and an accordian was playing woozily. I caught snippets of conversations - ill-advised sexual liaisons, stealing from work, amateur art criticism, how hammered we'd be getting later - all topics for the cafe queue. Having seen this well-kept street with its row of time-burnished yellow bricks and low garrett-above-the-shop accommodation on a non-market day, this just seemed to exploit the idea of a market. Like one of the strange touring Christmas markets which are popular nowadays, but this destined to run and run as long as people wanted to browse these wares and take "time out on a weekend morning". I wanted purposeful, grubby Ridley Road, not this.
With my badly chosen shoes beginning to hurt my feet, I hopped on a bus here. The 106 was cool and quiet, and sped me through the confused jumble of Hackney Central. I'd hoped to walk this part, but given my wish to get away from Broadway Market swiftly the bus seemed like a compromise. The route meandered, along Amhurst Road to the station, then into Clapton and over the Lea Bridge Roundabout with it's deserted nightclubs and bus depot. I was on uncharted territory here, and enjoyed watching unfamiliar streets pass by. Hopped off just before the bus reached Stoke Newington High Street - it's always important to enter a new street on foot at least on the first occasion I think - and made for the first coffee shop I could find. I got lucky here, the establishment was cool, quiet and run by an open-faced and smiling waitress who chatted happily to everyone who came in. The coffee was great and cheap, and made me feel guilt for my open support for the brand leaders in the market. I wish I felt more communicative and could have struck up a talk about the area, but with the mornings exertions preying on my feet and rather turbulent and confused thoughts I wanted to get down on paper, I was content to sit and write. I was also considering my next move.
I'm ashamed I'd never visited Abney Park Cemetery. I'd read lots about it, and understood it's origins and importance - but it was on a list of 'get there eventually' locations. Today though, was the day - and as I walked north on the High Street, I was surprised by the sudden opening out of a small courtyard, with the famous egyptian pillars set back a few yards from the busy road. There is always the awkward moment when entering a burial yard - particularly a closed one - is it seemly to take pictures? Should one browse like at an art gallery? My approach is to wander aimlessly and see where I end up - and in fairness this has worked from Bunhill Fields to the Glasgow Necropolis, so I aimed for the same. Oddly though, Abney Park is strangely informal. Small groups of people enjoying a short burst of sunshine on the otherwise dull morning sat chatting, people used the space to walk, exercise - a dedicated woman using the hidden war memorial as a venue for circuit training. There was a sense that the community and the cemetery were at peace - mutually appreciative. Unlike many such places, Abney Park felt safe - it was patrolled, used well and despite its warren-like density of routes, it was impossible to be wholly alone here. I passed a mum and her young child, who begged her to only use the "big paths" and assured her that they "wouldn't see any deads". I saw his point, the tangle of tiny paths between the jumbled, leaning graves must have seemed impossibly horrible to him! I took one, to reassure myself, and found a strange, quiet and cool world under the trees. There was no traffic noise, despite the site being surrounded on three sides by busy London thoroughfares. Just warm, green silence and cold marble memorials.
I spent a little longer than planned at Abney Park, because it was a welcoming and open place where wandering was the norm and not a strange or suspicious activity. The natural environment seemed like a fitting burial place - more so than the ordered and crimped cemeteries which are the norm nowadays. I pondered this back to Liverpool Street on the train, and sat for a while in yet another a coffee shop - this time one which has recently opened in an impressively panelled room in the former Great Eastern Railway station buildings. I also thought I should do this more often - these walks lift my spirits, even the gloom which Milton Keynes seemingly dispelled. I also planned a lazy circuit back west - firstly heading east into familiar territory, then south of the river. The plan was to walk to the new Shoreditch High Street station on the East London Line. I accomplished this via a fraught crossing of Bishopsgate, then a dash down Brushfield Street. The familiar outline of awe-inspiring Christ Church loomed over a range of new boutiques and stalls in the revitalised but partially-destroy Spitalfields Market. Then, along Hanbury Street and into Brick Lane, the sudden pulse of life coinciding with a brief shower of rain. I didn't let it worry me, and watched people scurrying into shops and under the new railway bridge as I pressed on. The walk here is always so inspiring and diverting I barely noticed how wet I was as I turned into Sclater Street - the remnants of the market now a couple of rough stalls on a car park and some remarkably well-stock vintage clothes shops tucked into the old railway arches. The sign for the old Spitalfields Station still in the condition I found it two years ago, bent back on its pole and pointing the wrong way to a long-deleted terminus. The new station, a concrete and glass box - but with some impressive views over the former goods yard, was cool and pleasant to wait in despite the rather narrow platforms!
And so, via Brunel's tunnel under the Thames and a change of trains at the ever impressive Crystal Palace station, I made my way back to Victoria with a little time to spare. Parking myself in a convenient coffee shop I jotted notes about my strange weekend and watched the comings and goings around the station. It had been a frustrating and surprising weekend in equal measure. Now I had to deal with more immediate issues, and rather unusually spirits beckoned! A visit to London is never wise for helping one be objective.
You can see more pictures from the walk here.
Lost::MikeGTN
I've had a home on the web for more years than I care to remember, and a few kind souls persuade me it's worth persisting with keeping it updated. This current incarnation of the site is centred around the blog posts which began back in 1999 as 'the daylog' and continued through my travels and tribulations during the following years.
I don't get out and about nearly as much these days, but I do try to record significant events and trips for posterity. You may also have arrived here by following the trail to my former music blog Songs Heard On Fast Trains. That content is preserved here too.
