Drawing The Heat - Summer on the edge of the city...
Posted in London on Saturday 19th July 2014 at 5:04pm
I know all too well that sometimes I have a skewed view of London. Coming here early last year with a new perspective on the city reminded me of how bewildering it can be - how diverse, how hard to fix in the mind, how shifty the place can feel under your feet. This visit amplified that sense for us in some ways, while also allowing us to find some curiously pleasant corners too. This time we found ourselves in Hoxton, staying at a hotel we'd fancied visiting for a while and exploring both nearby and further afield. It was a hot day when we arrived, maddeningly so because there was just no air to be found in the city. We slogged across town slowly, giving up and walking the last stretch, and slumped into the cool, pleasant hotel surroundings. Outside the pavements baked and reflected heat back up at us. We were at least safe in this little bubble of neatly designed, air-conditioned wonder.
But to be here without getting my feet on the ground was equally maddening, so for the couple of days we were here, I took to heading out early in the morning and pounding the still cool pavements before the city woke. It was already hot when I left the hotel, with the morning sun hovering just over the warehouses and collapsing factories of the east. Shoreditch was its usual enigma - a place being gentrified by a class of people bent on resisting the appearance of gentrification. I recalled a first walk here maybe twenty years back - the buildings weren't much changed in many ways, but their contents were wildly different. It would be easy to lampoon the specialist tea shops, artisan bakeries and high-end designer furnishing emporia - but it would also be unfair. The district is evolving and alive, despite the sense of dissociation from its history. This is change - and it's happened here, more than anywhere, for more than a thousand busy years. As I walked, a trickle of hipsters began to emerge - some heading home after their Friday night, others leaving for work. At the junction of Great Eastern Street and Shoreditch High Street, cultures clashed. The 'real' East End of halal kebab shops and travel agencies swings in from Bethnal Green, the gentrified north holds fast refusing to change, and the City leers hungrily to the south. It was an oddly contested spot which echoed the strange days we were having.
Pressing on south, I decided to enter the city. At a weekend always a strange pleasure with the feel of an inhuman landscape which has been suddenly abandoned by its inhabitants. Glasses grew sticky on tables outside pubs and little refused to whirl in the windless morning. Bishopsgate was silent and dry, the sun just starting to glare back from the glass monsters which line the street. The cleaners had been out before me and the vague hint of disinfectant drying in the air was apparent. I could hear my own footsteps as I trudged south past the row of Police cars which are stationed in the median of the street near the Police Station, but always look haphazardly abandoned. The only life was the faint buzz of activity around Liverpool Street station, so I wandered in for coffee and the opportunity to watch people. It was a curious and unsettling morning, and I needed to see the world waking up. Stations always anchor me, always fix me on a national and local map I'm capable of holding in my head mostly. After a silly customer service argument, I lingered over my hard-won cup for a while.
My next opportunity for a stroll came later that afternoon. The sun was still high in its arc, and the air felt dead and flat. But I'd been encouraged to get out and enjoy the visit despite the airless heat, if I could. I knew I could. The ridiculous feats of Summer 2012 - my own Olympic achievements - were evidence of this. I set out into the fringe of Hoxton this time - a little knot of streets I'd shamefully enough been happy to weave into my critical narrative but never truly explored. Crossing into Old Street by way of the curiously attractive, narrow winding of Rivington Street, I noted a pop-up market in full swing. Noted for later, I arrived at the impressive crossroads with Shoreditch High Street. The old station towered alongside the Town Hall and the Court building. A little knot of fading municipality which still felt vital because of the buzz of traffic and the overspill of Hoxton bars into the corner. It felt like the not-so-distant Dalston Junction in many ways. But in an earlier - or perhaps later stage of transformation. Not so shabby, not so vaguely dangerous, but just as strangely interesting. I lingered a while before pressing east onto Hackney Road. I'd traversed this path so many times on buses, dating back to an early stay in the area in fact, but I'd never really walked the streets. What a day to choose! The air crackled with heat and frustration. I looked and felt hugely out-of-place here. I trudged on, cars passing and oozing out loud music. Interesting views opened up through side-streets leading to alleys and estates, but I pressed on - pausing only to grab a drink before crossing the street and plunging into the cool green of Haggerston Park. Skirting the City Farm, I crossed the busy park diagonally. The locals were enjoying the place. Individual sunbathers read novels and baked, while little knots of youngsters drank and laughed. Families wandered through, sticking to the pathways. It felt strangely comforting in this inhospitably hot weather to see people out basking. Emerging on Whiston Road I contemplated a bus, but decided to press on to Albion Drive. To pay homage to Iain Sinclair? Perhaps - but also because I didn't feel I'd walked enough yet. So I set out again, noting the changes in the area since I'd walked it seven years ago. High rise buildings were being edged out by plesant low-rise estates. The area was quieter, less edgy and less ominous. Or perhaps the heat had beaten even the spirit of Hackney? A turn into Albion Drive is a turn into another century. Pretty villas, tidy frontages and only the preponderance of wheelie bins to ruin the illusion of time-travel. I did a circuit of the street, out to the east and back to the west, noting how it broke down into segments of single- and multiple-occupation. A book could be written about these homes, their strange stories and their unlikely survival in modern London. Nodding to Sinclair, I paused in the little square and rested on a bench. The throb of the city was just audible and was calling me back.
My walk and bus back were uneventful - an improbable dive under the newly reinstated railway line on Haggerston Road, and I emerged onto the splutter and drone of Kingsland Road. I let a bus pass by picking the quieter second one, which coincidentally took me along Old Street to a stop not far from where I'd started. Sometimes London does this - connects things up in strangely convenient and logical ways. It's this sense of things being well-fitted and close together which makes Londoners think that other cities don't work or are less convenient. But so often London disconnects too. We seek the journeys which make our lives simpler, and sometimes find the challenging trips seem impossible. London this weekend had, at times felt impossible to us. But like this bus, appearing just at the right time, there are always strange opportunities here.
It's been a while since I got to travel to London - and certainly it's a long time since I found myself alone there. In fact, it's become so usual to be part of a pair, visiting and revisiting haunts, that I'd forgotten some of the associations which Paddington has accumulated in recent years. As well as being the launchpad for many a wander and the welcome first sight of the way home, it's become associated with separation and loss - and I chewed this over a little on my journey east. Today would unravel some of that in a sense - I was here alone, but I'd be travelling back to my wife and my new home later. It was a remarkably cheering - and still weirdly novel - prospect, and after an unexpectedly bright journey up I greeted the vaulted roof of the station with the warm familiarity gained only by enduring both happy and melancholy moments together - Paddington is an old friend who I don't see nearly as often as I'd like.
Taking advantage of the early arrival I hopped directly onto a 205 bus. The city was busy - as ever I'd utterly failed to predict events, and there were various goings-on which were adding to the traffic - not least Wimbledon. We made slow but steady progress around the arc of the Euston Road. It was good to see the familiar, solid sights as we edged forward. I'd repeated this trip so many times, eastward with hope and expectation and westward with satisfaction, tired feet and a checklist of new prospects to investigate - the city slowly revealing itself by being walked. The Crossrail works were still affecting the ever-excavated Moorgate, so we zigzagged into Shoreditch, approaching Liverpool Street from the east and north. A few confused passengers scrambled off in surprise and we pressed on, the bus almost empty now. It still hadn't started to rain, despite an ominous cloud, so I bailed early, finding myself on the dry pavement near Whitechapel Road Market. I had a loose itinerary, as ever fanning out eastwards from the city edge - and this time based on a reading of W.G. Sebald's Austerlitz. This tangled, dense web of prose had provided much food for thought, but most immediately it had opened my thoughts to the array of tiny Jewish burial grounds scattered through the eastern edges of London. I had worked out a very rough route which led to several of them - including the Ashkenazi burial ground on Alderney Road which had initially sparked this walk. Opened in 1697, the site is enclosed by the houses fronting Mile End Road and a high wall facing a tired but interesting square of homes. It was quiet and rather humid, voices carried from a nearby playground and a large St.George flag flapped from an upstairs window. The door in the wall was closed, and a chink of light through a letterbox jammed with circulars unwanted by the dead revealed little. I skirted the site which connects to the Velho - the oldest of these sites, and entirely enclosed by the properties. No amount of trespass was going to get me a view inside, so I set off across the quiet square towards Bancroft Road. Here, almost in the precincts of the weird ziggurat of Mile End Hospital, there is more to see. The cemetary is now a quiet green space, most of the stones lying flat on the ground. Beyond, a shallow viaduct carries the line from Liverpool Street, little hope of eternal peace with trains to Chingford and Cambridge shaking the graves. After following my instincts into a dead end near the hospital grounds, I retraced my steps. The old men sitting outside a polish cafe seemed amused to see me re-emerging from the little network of streets. I wandered back to the main road, a little footsore given how long it had been since I walked.
Having been mostly thwarted in my primary purpose I needed to decide how to proceed. The answer of course lay eastwards - it had been too long since I'd walked this way, and I needed to feel familiar pavement underfoot. I set out along the endless corridor of Mile End Road as it turned into a valley between cliffs of new-built student dwellings, occasionally punctuated by heritage buildings now featuring gourmet burger joints. The traffic was incessant, hypnotic even. The clouds rolled forward - already there was a haze towards the river, and rain threatened. As I reached the Green Bridge near the Regent's Canal, it began. A heavy downpour of the type which cannot ever sustain itself long. I dived into the cafe I'd often spotted under the bridge. A young, smiling woman broke off her cleaning to make my latte. A sole other customer sat nearby, staring at us as we conducted the transaction. I sat near the window, pulled out a map, regrouped and watched the rain slow to a trickle. The cafe owner arrived with friends, dripping gold and sarcasm. He clasped his friends necks like a cartoon Mafiosi and chortled unpleasantly, leering at the cafe girl. "Your boyfriend here?" he glared at the other customer, whilst addressing her. She coloured up, looked away and he pointed out the purple stain of a bite on her neck to his friends who snorted and gurgled. The boy scrambled for the exit in shame and horror. The girl's smile faded. I left too - the vague sense of despair hanging over the place was too much to bear. It was still raining a little but the pavement was preferable. I pressed on east, and let the rain soak into my sweater - it began to feel a little too wet as I approached Bow Road station so I sheltered at a bus stop, exchanged messages home, and waited...
Finally I decided I needed to move on. There was nothing to lose by getting wet, and I had plenty of time to dry off later. I edged carefully around Bow Roundabout and descended the steps to the towpath. A favourite spot - even drenched and still feeling oddly dispirited by the cafe, this was somewhere I felt at ease. As the canal surface sparkled with rainfall, I trudged the wet grit of the path, bumping into only the very occasional cyclist coming towards me. To my right, the heft of the Olympic Stadium bulked out the view. It was in the process of being dismantled and reinvented for its next incarnation. After passing the junction with the Hertford Union Canal I had a choice to make. I'd meant to head for White Post Lane, but the slope up to the Greenway was tempting . In the end I let instinct win and I found myself once again topping the Northern Outfall Sewer, striking out towards the View Tube where I knew coffee and shelter were available. Soon I was seated, steaming in the warm cafe and sipping an excellent coffee. As the mist evaporated from the windows, I found myself looking out at the Olympic Park and realised that it was now possible for me to walk in unmolested. Years of being excluded from the site were over at last, and here I was idly passing my precious day of walking in this makeshift cafeteria on the edge of the park. Finishing my coffee and packing away my notebook, I set out to break new ground...
I thought first of Tellytubbies. That strange, hyper-real green sward which the odd humanoids danced and capered on was before me. The park undulated, bursts of colourful flora floated above it. Ranks of lighting columns marked the footpaths, and they led down - to the City Mill River. To that stretch of river which had been an impossible goal until now. I scrambled down the steps two and three at a time, and at the foot I found a junction. Southwards lay a fenced off path under the railway, not yet ready for me. Northwards, the river curved around the foot of the stadium. I followed the curve, a vast green bank to my right as the river edged the huge bowl. I had been close to the stadium before, but never this close. The bridges arced overhead, approaching the entrances - and I calculated with a look at careful notes I'd made exactly where the stockpile of low-level waste was stashed. I touched the aggregate pile which turned the horrible cargo into a simple bridge abutment and felt connected back to years of reading and writing about the Olympics. It had passed, things had moved on, but here was tangible evidence of all that had been expressed. I moved on, finding myself almost emotional at the thought of being inside the fence at last. So much change seemed to hinge on that period, personally, nationally even. It was a moment to take stock and move forward... and I did, towards the monolithic Orbit - less a sculpture and more a watchtower close-up. I wander around it, gazing up, trying to capture in a photograph the dizzying sense of queasy instability that it's odd curves elicit. It's still a very silly, unpleasant structure, a balancing lump of concrete sitting atop a twisted tower of steel. Without meaning or merit, neither beautiful nor sublime. The pathways radiating out from it took me towards another waterway, and I traced this to it's junction with the River Lea under a rather pleasant copper faced bridge, which reflected the water and it's pathways. It was hot and humid again, with dark clouds tumbling towards us from the south. I skirted the river, crossed it and emerged on the eastern side. Small concession stands selling overpriced snacks lined this route. Families and park employees wandered around yet I still felt like a trespasser. The pathway ended at a road crossing - across the street the park continued, and a stream of young people dressed in white t-shirts with coloured facepaint were streaming towards a makeshift stage. Wardens directed them as they trollied their cargo of lager towards the site. The Holi Festival of Colours sounded like a spiritual event, but appears to be a heavily marketed appropriation of an authentic Indian festival. People turn up colourless and leave scattered with paint dust and optimism. I turned aside and wandered along Loop Road which leads to White Post Lane. Territory became familiar. The rooftops and graffiti of Hackney Wick appeared overhead. It was odd and rather disorienting to see them from this angle. I wasn't ready for this conclusion so I turned back towards the stadium and edged along the River Lea, descending briefly into a wonderful nursery garden behind tiny wicket gates. It felt unreal and strange, under this ominous sky beside the sweep of the stadium. Unseen from this angle, the cranes removing the top layer of the stands hummed and clanked. I found myself following a makeshift pathway which wound towards the Navigation and deposited me on the towpath again, not too far from where I'd entered the park. The heavens opened. I sheltered under a bridge for what seemed like an age.
The break allowed me to gather my thoughts a little. I realised I'd been wandering aimlessly and letting the strange emotional twist of finally entering this site of exclusion and alienation getting the better of me. I needed to regain control of my walk, and I did so by following the towpath to White Post Lane, and ascending to the street. This was the sentry post - even a year ago blocked and caged still. But now it was simply a road between the forlorn edge of the Wick and the weird sheen of the park. Still a gateway, but unmanned and unacknowledged by officialdom now. I explored the bridge, walking back and forth over it, half expecting to be hindered by a passing security guard. It didn't happen so I renetered the park, and turned left onto a curving road called Clarnico Lane - a nod to the past which took me up to Waterden Road. The Lea continued into the North Park, but would have to wait for a day when it wasn't busy with revellers. I walked back to Stratford, battling against the tide of youngsters, bright eyed, expectant. More girls than boys, the odd strange older woman yelping and whooping among them. A strange mix. An odd idea. Such is the future of this biggest of public parks. I found coffee and electricity in the whirl of Westfield and made notes.
My route back east took my back along the same route by bus - looping into an as yet unused bus station near the press centre, soon to be a new media outpost at the east of the city. Then I was onto the familiar roads around Victoria Park. This had been the edge, but now it was just a stop along the way. I had new paths to tread, the possibility of completing my navigation by river in the area - and oddly I found I didn't entirely dislike what had become of the Olympic Zone. I missed it's oddness, its ragged rurality, the strange emptiness of the wilderness that used to be here - but the sweeps of green, the views that opened, the sense of being in a valley between swathes of the city was new and intriguing. I allowed myself to dry off as I headed homewards, unsure when I'd be heading back this way. The storm had broken, and my old ideas about this part of the city had been washed away. But there were new layers of exposed earth to sift...
There's no doubt that the last few weeks have been some of the most difficult and strange of my life, but also that strangely I've never felt more grateful for the people around me. It struck me too that, had things taken such a strange turn before I settled into this new way of life, I'd have been facing a time of change and sadness alone. It's almost certain that I'd have reacted by travelling - using movement as a refuge. Today, we decided to do just that.
We set our early in surprisingly bright sunshine. There was an uninspiring forecast, but for now at least the day appeared clear and bright - one of those days when clouds can suddenly obscure the sun turning the air cool for a moment. Last minute travel arrangements meant a seat in what was going to be a busy standard class coach, and when we boarded it became clear that First Great Western had decided not to include any seat reservations. Chaos followed, but somehow we managed to avoid any problems. Settled into our seats we watched Wiltshire and Oxfordshire slip by, soon arriving into Didcot Parkway. Didcot fares poorly in the national psyche somehow. It's station seems to be a byword for "neglected and beleagured" in comedic patter - and it's easy to see why. The cooling towers of the power station loom overhead, and the former yard - now a Great Western Society preservation site - stretches away from the platforms. Locomotives sit idling between trips. A lone trainspotter waits on the platforms, all his colleagues having probably gone to see the Western passing at Foxhall Junction instead. I've spent time here, enjoying a quiet morning with breakfast and trains, before heading into London - a split ticket here used to be the best value. Today though, it's quiet and we're heading around the curve into Oxford soon.
Given the dubious weather our strategy is to get the measure of the place first via the City Tour Bus. Boarding at the station, the first part of the journey is curiously bleak - edging past the stark, funereal Thatcher wing of the Said Business School and into the southern fringe of the city. This area was comprehensively redeveloped in the 1960s, when heritage wasn't a byword. Thus it's a mess of carparks, poorly built offices and shopping complexes. Passing the stumpy hillock which was Oxford Castle, the commentary on the bus urges us to picture scenes from medieval times - something we don't manage to conjure until the bus has turned north again and into the City Centre. At Carfax Tower we turn east and speed out to Magdalen College before skirting the centre again and heading north to St.Hugh's Collge and then south again among the university-owned villas and private houses to the city. With the weather determinedly grey but not yet wet, we hop out and start to explore on foot.
Our walk takes us first to Turl Street to find coffee, and then via the Bodleian Library and the vast Blackwell's book store. The rather unassuming, if attractive frontage fails to betray just how huge and meandering this shop is - and this isn't entirely obvious until The Norrington Room opens before us. As we head out, its clear that there is an event underway at the Sheldonian Theatre, as smartly attired parents shuffle into the building. We skirt the theatre, heading for the Radcliffe Camera and the courtyard of the Bodleian - both of which are captivating and rather other-wordly. Through the gates we glimpse the end of a graduation ceremony, with robed students milling and a rather larger than expected contingent of photographers pressed against the railing. Edging around Radcliffe Square we come upon All Souls' with Hawksmoor's handiwork more than evident. A glimpse through the gates shows the Wren sundial on the Codrington Library. As we push our cameras against the gate we're disturbed by a hubbub in the street. A photographer, trotting backwards and toting his huge lens, breathlessly says "turn around now and you'll get the shot of your life".
The next few moments are a blur. I spin and see graduates walking slowly from the Sheldonian, a line of photographers ahead of them snapping vigorously. A line of people pass flanking a graduate in her robes who flicks a glance back over her shoulder. It's newly graduated Dr. Chelsea Clinton. Suddenly the scene fits - the guys walking beside the party with earpieces are Secret Service. The tall, slim, tanned looking gent beside Chelsea is President Clinton, and on her other arm the shorter blue suited woman in a hat is Secretary of State Clinton. For both of us, it's our first near encounter with a living US President, and it's a strange mixture of excitement, confusion and disappointment that we weren't smart enough to see what was happening sooner and point our cameras.
Eventually we follow the Clinton party out of the square, and find ourselves close to The Grand Cafe. My research before our trip had marked this out as a spot to visit, and sure enough it was an impressive interior with wonderful inter-war decoration. The service was a little haphazard, and the food pretty ordinary, but it felt like a fine place to reflect on the day so far. From her our walk took us into the quieter backstreets around Merton College and the wonderfully named Logic Lane before heading back to the station via a quick pint. With the sun now a little brighter and the day a touch warmer, we hopped on the tour bus to get us back to the station and thence homeward. It had been good to get out, and even better to explore a city which I'd hardly done justice to in the past. I can only hope the Clinton's had just as fine a time in Oxford today!
Having been in Seattle for a few days now, I was beginning to readjust to its unique rhythm. Our initial stay downtown had plunged me into the cosmopolitan, urban feel of the city which had begun, a long time back, to feel like a home away from home. This time I didn't feel like a stranger - more a returning ex-pat perhaps? It was interesting to prowl the streets early with Iain Sinclair's less than ringing endorsements from American Smoke in mind: tired, stressed and with a sick wife back at the hotel, he'd paced the city streets and seen only the gray reflections of clouds. Here for very different reasons, the silvery sheen of Elliot Bay reflected in tall glass blocks was like a visual sigh of relief. We'd made it. We were back.
But today, the pace changed again. With an extended visit to Montlake necessary, I had some time to cut loose and wander. A rare luxury in a trip with a packed itinerary and little scope for drift. With a Fuel coffee in hand I set off towards the Arboretum. I didn't intend to stray far - maybe to a quiet spot to read or write, while drinking? The edge of the park was abrupt, Lynn Street taking a ninety degree curve and the path heading into the trees. There were a few walkers dotted around, a bored woman scrolling listlessly at an iPad while her child clambered on the play equipment at the park entrance. I plunged into the trees feeling foreign and conspicuous, and far less acclimatised than I'd felt downtown. The tall evergreens closed around the path, and the unexpectedly clear sky all but disappeared as I pushed on. Turning a corner, a narrow but ornate bridge carried the path over the rush of Lake Washington Boulevard and into deeper wilderness. I was alone and comfortable at last. The path crested and turned north, with the rooftops of the Visitor Center below. A cursory glance at a pathside map had shown water up ahead, and my urge to walk near waterways was kindled. I edged through the drifting pedestrians and crossed the street near the Park entrance, plunging across to a viewpoint and a new path alongside an inlet of Union Bay. I sat for a moment and drained my coffee cup. It seemed wrong to have it along for this part of the walk somehow. Refreshed, I set off at a renewed pace - the slight edge of being in an entirely unknown place speeding my walk. The path meandered through dense trees and curved towards a road - the acoustic footprint of Highway 520 was near, but I had no sense of quite how near until the path dipped under a forbidding looking underpass. I was encouraged to see others passing through the concrete tunnel under the footings of the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge. Traffic pounded and echoed through the dingy gap, and only the sight of water on the other side of the span urged me to continue. I really had no sense of where I was headed. As it turned out, the scene quickly opened out into a busy, spacious picnic area on Foster Island. The lake surrounded three sides of the promontory, with a beachlike feel to the northern shore, where sailing boats scudded past at speed. The sun was high, and students from the nearby university lounged and occupied the picnic tables. I headed for the water's edge, before looking for the path off the island marked as the Marsh Trail.
As I dived between two tall patches of rushes and scuffed along the bark trail, I realised that I was surrounded by water. This pathway floated on the scrubby marshlands at the edge of Lake Washinton. Indeed in some spots it was nearly submerged in the lake. Again, I was perturbed and considered a retreat, but the site of others coming towards me, apparently unscathed and not drenched spurred me on. The path zig-zagged out into the lake, a spur taking in a raised observation platform. Occasionally, an unguarded ramp would raise the path to wooden bridges which carried me out into clear water, descending onto further patches of marshy ground. Soon I was alone, a touch of concern arising as I really didn't know where the pathway led. A couple with a lolloping dog pursued me a distance back, and I decided to assume they knew where they were heading. They occasionally caught up as I paused to take pictures, their mutt shaking off lake water as he passed me, eliciting an apology as they overtook. The pathway descended another ramp onto Marsh Island, a boggy, half-formed mess of bark and reeds which gave a superb view across the lake to the Montlake Bridge. I resolved to get there if I could. Meanwhile the causeway and off-ramps of 520 soared above, the constant white-noise of tyres on concrete hissing ominously. From here, the scale of the tangled junction for Montlake was clear, including the 'ramps to nowhere' which it seems are a feature of road systems all over the world. Beneath the pillars, scrubby edgelands waited for reclamation. This was a zone which nature might just win back someday.
At a junction where the bark trail touched land I had a choice - continue on the shoreline, or ascend to the carpark of the former MOHAI museum site. The latter seemed a more likely way of getting to the bridge, so I turned towards the building. The empty gray hulk reflected the sounds of the highway back at me, deserted and ominous amongst the greenery of the park. Few cars were using the parking area, except for a Seattle Police vehicle which was criss-crossing the top of the ramp which led down to the lake. I didn't pause at the building - it's status wasn't clear to me, and I knew from previous experience how contrary the SPD could be. Instead I tried to look purposeful and followed the path towards the street. At the top, the cop was waiting for me: "Everything OK sir?". I replied in the affirmative and he asked me what I was doing. I told him I was walking and he asked where I was heading. Perhaps here is where I should have thought faster, or been less honest because I simply said "I'm interested in the bridge at Montlake. How do I get there?". His demeanour changed and he replied by asking if I was a tourist. I agreed I was, and he brightened visibly, before suggesting that I go downtown. "There's shopping, and the Space Needle. Nothing to see up here". I tried to explain that I was a walker, interested in canals and bridges, but he became more insistent that I shouldn't be in Montlake. Tourists belonged Downtown where they could be managed around the grid of the city. I decided that his growing coldness, his look of dismay and the handgun at his side were all good reasons to disappear. I thanked him and moved away towards the street, and he called after me that there were "...plenty of buses over there". I waved a hand behind me and struck up a pace. My experiences a summer ago had told me that some games were lost from the outset.
Once over the highway I cut along side streets which led me back to Montlake Boulevard. Recognising businesses and landmarks I felt a little proud of my navigation skills, and a little embarrassed that I'd let the cop send me off course so easily. Perhaps if he'd not found me inspecting an abandoned civic building he'd have been less concerned? Perhaps if I'd simply had a purpose to my walk? Even just getting from A to B seems better than "walking, just walking" as a descriptor to those people who find such things so terrifyingly inexact. I thought back to Iain Sinclair's miserable experience here, and despite my own brush with the gray edge of the city, still couldn't reconcile it.
You will shortly be able to see more pictures from the walk here. As an experiment, you can also follow the route on the map below - the blue line is the walking route.
View Arboretum & Marsh Island Walk in a larger map
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.
