London Loop Section 3 – Hayes Common to Petts Wood

I seem to use the London Loop as a device to re-orientate myself after time away from the city. The outer London orbital path resets my internal compass. So after my trip to Berlin with my son, I returned to the Loop at Hayes in the London Borough of Bromley to pick up the path I left in August last year.

Probably the greatest thing about the London Loop is how it exposes just how green a city London actually is. That although the capital clawed the surrounding countryside into its grasp, consuming chunks of Surrey, Kent, Essex, Hertfordshire and nearly the whole of Middlesex, large swathes of verdant land remains. The Loop takes you through farmland, country parks, woodlands, nature reserves, parks, along riverbanks, and naturally … golf courses. And Section 3 that took me from Hayes Common to Petts Wood turned out to be possibly the greenest section so far.

As I hone in on the conclusion to my four years walking the London Loop I realise just how many of the memorable walks of that time have been on the Loop. I could pick out highlights then that would simply be a rundown of the route so far – from Enfield Lock through Uxbridge, over the Thames at Kingston to where I ended up at Petts Wood. I may draw out the last two sections just so I don’t have to end the circuit just yet.