Boxing Day Walk

Antelope Leyton

I start with no fixed plan and follow my feet along Midland Road, Leyton then down Farmer Road to Church Road and the still boarded up Antelope pub. There’s been online chatter about getting this place open again and despite the success of other revived pubs in the area the Antelope continues to lie dormant.

Etloe House, Leyton
Etloe House with its secret water sources of legend in the grounds

I contemplate heading towards the Angel or wonder whether to turn towards Walthamstow. We’re spoilt for choice.

Dagenham Brook, Leyton
All Hail the Dagenham Brook
Marsh Lane Leyton
Marsh Lane

It’s cold and my beanie is still damp from being caught in Christmas Day rain. My pate is chilled. Walking down Marsh Lane reminds me of the pre-Olympic protests of 2006 and 2007 (filmed for BBC documentaries) when it was feared this ancient open space would be gobbled up by the land-grab.

railway bridge at Leyton
Lee Navigation
boat on Lee Navigation

I miss the old Waterworks Pitch and Putt.
Cross the Friends Bridge to Hackney Marshes and then onto the towpath for a short section to Leyton Marsh.
Woodsmoke on the towpath. Bohemian London is afloat.
People walking in big Boxing Day family groups. People up from the country. Clean wellies.

I’ll save the walk from here into the City for a tracing of the Black Path that I’ll shoot for YouTube.

Lea Valley Riding Centre
Lea Valley Riding Centre
bridge from Walthamstow Marsh to Argall Industrial Area
the bridge of flies
Argall Industrial Area
Argall Industrial Area
Excalibur House Argall Industrial Area
Excalibur Works
Excalibur House Argall Industrial Area

Into Argall Industrial Area. I love it here for some reason. Excalibur Works appears as almost the perfect brick unit – a gorgeous monument to industrial modernism. I want a studio/ workspace here. The light is incredible. I get a flood of happy memories of walks that’ve taken me through industrial estates around the fringe of London, often at sunset in glowing light.
There’s a strong smell of bread in the air.

Low Hall Woodland

People are working out to music at Low Hall Recreation Ground.
I take the path up through the woodland – like a country lane. A small dog tries to pick up a stick that’s far too big. A toddler waves goodbye to a particularly large puddle.

Walthamstow High Street
Walthamstow High Street
Ricco's Walthamstow High Street
Ricco’s

The vibe in Ricco’s coffee bar on Walthamstow High Street has changed since my school-run days. This was my go-to place on the High Street on laps from Leytonstone. But the coffee and sandwiches are still good.

Walthamstow Mall Tower building site

The town centre tower as viewed from the viewing terrace in the Mall – seemingly constructed to offer a platform to watch the never-ending building works.
I emerge from the Mall into the gloom of 4.15pm.
There’s magic in the gloaming.

Path through St Mary's Walthamstow
St Mary’s Walthamstow

Up Church Hill then through St Mary’s Churchyard to the Village, which seems unusually quiet. I’m starting to feel tired. Turn down Eden Road to Leyton High Road. Over Leyton Green into Essex Road and the straight path to the Red Lion for restorative pints with Joe.

Kebab shop on Leyton High Road
Leyton High Road
Greenwich Meridian, Leyton
Essex Road, Leyton

Plaque unveiling in Swedenborg Gardens

Swedenborg Gardens plaque unveiling
Photo by Mark Riley

The other Saturday saw the unveiling of a plaque commemorating the association of Swedish philosopher, theologian, scientist and mystic, Emanuel Swedenborg and Prince’s Square, Shadwell. Swedenborg Gardens now marks the area where the Swedish Church once stood and where Emanuel Swedenborg was originally buried.

Swedenborg Gardens plaque unveiling
Iain Sinclair at the unveiling of the plaque in Swedenborg Gardens
Iain Sinclair
Iain Sinclair and John Rogers at Swedenborg Gardens

Stephen McNeilly from Swedenborg House and a Tower Hamlets Councillor unveiled the plaque, the Iain Sinclair spoke eloquently about the legacy of Emanuel Swedenborg’s relationship with London and the lasting imprint he left behind. I then spoke briefly about the recent video I made with Iain and Stephen tracing the footprints of Swedenborg’s London.

Swedenborg Gardens
Emanuel Swedenborg plaque, Swedenborg Gardens

A New Wetlands for Leytonstone

Wanstead Flats wetlands

Taking a sunset stroll on Wanstead Flats this evening I stumbled upon this marvellous new Wetlands on the rough ground beside Harrow Road Playing Fields.

Wanstead Flats map

“© OpenStreetMap contributors” using data available under the Open Database Licence

It’s evident that the channels around the pond have been recently dug to form a network of ditches – a Leytonstone Wetlands, with the tall rushes rising around the edge of the waterscape, birds fleeting between the reeds and bushes. Previously the pond was lost in amongst the brambles, overgrown and hard to reach, choked by the undergrowth. This has now been cut back, opening out this new landscape.

Old map of Leytonstone

1863 Map of Leytonstone Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland https://maps.nls.uk/index.html

The pond can clearly be seen on this 1863 Map of Essex (published 1873) with what could be a channel or ditch leading to Harrow Lane (now Road). So this is a wonderful restoration of the historic landscape of the area. Wood House and Wood Cottage are also interesting features on this map.

These trees have stories – Epping Forest

trees

Epping Forest Walk – Loughton Camp to Epping via Ambresbury Banks

I head into the forest at 3.15pm in the rain – up from Loughton Station straight to Loughton Camp – a place of peace, retreat. Rain taps on the fallen leaves. The gloom and rain mean there’s not a soul around. The mighty trees look over me.

trees

These trees have stories – great mythologies, lineages stretching back millenia. I wish I could hear their tales, if I stand still for long enough and listen to the breeze will I gain their trust?

Epping Forest

Epping Forest path

A large white horse stands on a bend on the the high path through Great Monk Wood like a mythical beast. I chat to the rider and compare notes on traveling through the forest in the last light. We part in opposite directions wishing each other well. I have a distance to go to reach Epping and it’s now just before sunset.

trees

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trees

trees

It’s dark when I cross the road and onto Ambresbury Banks. I stand to admire the deep entrenchment – in many ways more imposing than Loughton Camp.

Ambresbury Banks

Ambresbury Banks

It’s pitch black now – but I have a nice wide path to guide me and the forest to myself. Not even an animal stirs or a nocturnal dog walker. How easy would it be to duck into the overgrowth, throw a tarp over some low branches and bed down for the night?

Trees

A fallen tree by the path in Epping Thicks glows white like a ghostly face on the edge of the path. I feel it in the pit of my stomach – and stand still.  When I move on I see movement through the trees, horses running along the ridge at the top of the forest …. before I see that it’s my walking giving the static tree trunks motion against the lights of Epping Town in the distance, like a woodland zoetrope. How the light plays tricks on the mind in the dark. The running horses were ghosts of my own mind.

The forest is still.

Epping

Epping cricket pavillion on the edge of the forest

 

 

Walk to the Bluebell Wood

Bluebells Devon

Bluebells and Wild Garlic burst from the high hedgerows on the lane up out of the North Devon village. Dad had said he’d show me the Bluebell Wood.

Devon walk

We headed out at 6pm for those last two hours of golden light, up along the lane that runs above the link road, hills rising in the distance. The Hawthorn was in flower (a little early?) and ‘the Old Fella’ told me how they used to eat the leaves when he was a kid, called them ‘bread and cheese’. I tried one, it didn’t taste anything like bread and cheese.

wild garlic

We passed a dell thick with Wild Garlic.

north devon walk IMG_7463

Over the fallow field and beside the perfect babbling brook to the edge of the Bluebell Wood.

Bluebell Wood North Devon IMG_7472

The pungent aroma of the Bluebells fills your nostrils as soon as you step over the stile into the wood. The flowers cascade down the hillside to the brook below. It’s almost too perfect.

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wild garlic

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At the end of the wood you splash through the water running downhill over cracked shale to a hill crested with oaks. I swear I spotted a Hobbit puffing on his pipe sitting in the shade.

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We didn’t have time to tackle the hill and the long loop back round to the village so we retraced our steps through the Bluebell Wood, over the fields and home.

 

 

 

Welcome to the (Waltham) Forest

Welcome to the Forest

Waltham Forest’s year as London’s first Borough of Culture got off to a spectacular start on Friday night. The launch event ‘Welcome to the Forest’, struck exactly the right tone, illuminating the Walthamstow sky, creating magic among the trees of Lloyd Park, and turning the modernist facade of the Town Hall into a kaleidascope of sound and image merging the urban with the sylvan in a glorious pulsing palimpsest. It was spine-tingling evocation of the Borough we love.

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Welcome to the Forest, Walthamstow

Welcome to the Forest, Walthamstow Town Hall

Welcome to the Forest, Lloyd Park, Walthamstow,

Welcome to the Forest John Rogers

I had some films showing in the brilliant Stow Film Lounge’s Silent Cinema, a special experience to mingle with the other viewers on the Lloyd Park tennis court listening to the soundtrack via headphones. John Smith’s Blight has never sounded so good.

Welcome to the Forest, Walthamstow, Borough of Culture, Friday 11th March 2019

Families meandered through the night garden of Lloyd Park marvelling at the light show, and interacted with the steampunk animals snorting out plumes of fire on Forest Road. An all ages crowd boogied on down at the Disco Shed.

2019 is going to be a special year – the forest is coming home.

 

Welcome to the Forest runs until Sunday 13th January 2019, 6.30-9.30pm