A wanderer in Paris

“I had come to France to do nothing but walk and eat”

– Jack Kerouac, Satori in Paris

The above quote from Jack Kerouac’s Satori in Paris would adequately describe the three days I recently spent in Paris with my youngest son. We walked and walked and ate and ate and it was all so glorious – just like the city itself. We had no other plan, and if there’s a city in which to allow yourself to be drawn by your desires and to simply drift, then it is the city that gave birth to the flaneur in the 19th Century covered arcades – the gaslit passages such as Passage Jouffroy, Passage Verdeau, and Passage des Panoramas.

These enclosed boulevards became the haunts of poets and curious pedestrians alike. The great German sociologist Walter Benjamin dedicated a huge study to the Paris Arcades, The Arcades Project and was inspired to wax lyrically about the wonders they held within; “The innermost glowing cells of the city of light, the old dioramas, nested in the arcades, one of which today still bears the name Passage des Panoramas. It was, in the first moment, as though you had entered an aquarium. Along the wall of the great darkened hall, broken at intervals by narrow joints, it stretched like a ribbon of illuminated water behind glass.”

Paris arcade
Paris arcade

For Benjamin the ultimate figure in the crowded arcades was the Flâneur, for him epitomized by Baudelaire, engaged in “aimless strolling, the ability to lose oneself in the crowd, populating one’s solitude.”

Joe and I aimlessly strolled from Montmartre to the Latin Quarter to browse the shelves in Shakespeare and Company and sat reading on an upstairs sofa while someone tinkered on the piano next door. We took a boat to The Eiffel Tower then walked a diagonal back across the city to Montmartre. We experienced the future of art exhibition at L’Atelier des Lumières and watched the hoards swarm around the Mona Lisa at the Louvre. A scooted through Père Lachaise Cemetery to find the grave of Jim Morrison and watched the illuminated red sails turn above the Moulin Rouge past midnight. But mostly we aimlessly wandered and savoured every meal – duck legs, mussels, lamb fillet, rump steak, croque monsieur, pancakes, panna cotta, caesar salad, country pate, and just the bread was amazing.

Paris people walking

Edmund White noted in his book, The Flâneur, “Paris is a world meant to be seen by the walker alone, for only the pace of strolling can take in all the rich (if muted) detail.” He writes how Benjamin explained that “the flâneur is in search of experience, not knowledge,” and that summarises our approach to this trip. Although we did scoot through some of the tourist hotspots we did so with innocence, seeking not dry facts, but the experience of place. And what a wonderful, magical experience it was.

A stroll round Oxford

This daytrip to Oxford came with the first whiff of Spring. I felt the excitement trickling through my nervous system as the train departed Marylebone for the ‘City of Youth’. And unlike those excursions where expectation and reality clash, the day unfolded like a dream in the radiant sun.

With no plan and a mostly unhelpful foldout map I just drifted the streets – down past Christ Church then back along the High Street and through the covered market. I took lunch sat outside in Turl Street not far from Brasenose College. Near the Bodleian Library I remembered the day I spent here shooting a BBC Culture Show with Russell Brand in 2007 that culminated in his address to the Oxford Union. A fun day.

Although I’d carried the image of finishing the day in a pub garden beside a river, when I reached the end of my perambulations I fancied a return to the ancient Turf Tavern where I’d spent an evening here celebrating the recent arrival of my 40th birthday. Emerging into the twilight I followed the voices in the alleyways (there’d been exams that morning) til I arrived at The Bear, said to be one of the oldest pubs in Oxford.

A glorious day and I shan’t leave it so long to return next time.

A return to Wycombe Wanderers

I hadn’t been to watch Wycombe Wanderers since 1997, when Martin O’Neil was manager and Steve Guppy was flying up the wing being berated by the home fans. Before yesterday that’d been my solitary trip to my hometown club’s new ground. Growing up I’d watched Wycombe at their historic Loakes Park ground with its famous sloping pitch. My grandfather had been an avid Wycombe fan, walking over the hills from Wooburn to Wycombe to watch the blues. My Dad’s cousin, Tony ‘Bodger’ Horseman, is still the Wycombe’s all-time record goalscorer and record appearance holder (a ‘bodger’ is a turner of chair legs – chair-making being the traditional industry of Wycombe).

Tony Bodger Horseman of Wycombe Wanderers
Tony ‘Bodger’ Horseman – photo Bucks Free Press

We had some Wycombe legends playing for our village cricket club, Wooburn Narkovians, captained by my Dad and where I spent all my summers till the age of 18 – Paul Birdseye who Captained Wycombe for many years (and batted No.3 for Wooburn), Geoff Anthony a Welsh Amateur International (and our wicketkeeper), Howard Kennedy who is among the top 10 appearance makers for the club, and Jack Timberlake who went to school with my Dad and ran the village grocers. Jack also helped set up and run Wooburn Wasps, the youth team where I played from aged 9 to 16. At one time the captain of England schoolboys came to play for us and I got scouted by a number of the big London clubs (we regarded Watford as a London club). This is all background to why I took my youngest son out to Wycombe for his first Wanderers match.

The Little Market House, Wycombe – designed by Robert Adam 1761

It was not only Joe’s first time at Adams Park, but his first proper look at the town of my birth (and where one side of our family can be traced back at least to the 1520s). So on the way to the ground I gave him a quick potted history – the Dial House on Crendon Street where Martin Lluelyn poet and Doctor to Charles I on the scaffold had lived, the Red Lion where Churchill sat astride while campaigning, the Market House marking the distances to London (29 miles) and Oxford (25 miles), the curious ancient stone by the Guildhall that someone suggested could be a mark stone from a neolithic stone circle (there’s another behind the nearby Parish Church). We walked past the old Multi-Racial Centre beneath the fly-over where a number of notable gigs took place in the 70s and 80s, on our way to look at Wycombe College where I did my A-levels. It’s now Buckinghamshire New University. It was interesting to find a plaque on the wall pointing out the original course of the River Wye before it was diverted through a culvert during the 1960s town centre redevelopment.

Paul's Row High Wycombe, August 2021 - the pavement shows the original course of the River Wye before it was culverted through the town centre

A later redevelopment, in the early 2000s, had brought me back to Wycombe to work on an art project with my sister, Cathy, that had been inspired by the scheme. Homesick living in Sydney, I’d searched online for news of my hometown and been surprised to see it unrecognisable from the descriptions of the plans for Project Phoenix. You can read about Remapping High Wycombe project here and download the text I wrote. Our walk through the town confirmed some of our fears of what the resulting Eden Shopping Centre would do to the surrounding parts of Wycombe. Many of the shops were boarded up on Crendon Street and the High Street with its historic medieval market was incredibly sombre compared to what it had been before Eden brought its covered mall to the Newlands carpark. Once one of the most prosperous towns in the country, the Guardian recently reported how it has become a ‘food insecurity hotspot’.

The Wycombe Stone
White Hart Street High Wycombe, August 2021 - photo by John Rogers, the lost byway
White Hart Street

But the spirit of Wycombe is strong, this is the town that started the English Civil War after all. And you can see signs of recovery in the town centre, since my last visit at the end of 2019. We made our way out to Adams Park nestled in the foothills of the Chilterns, and even Joe was beguiled by the sight of the hills rising above the stands. The atmosphere outside the ground was good with live music in the Chairboys Village in the carpark. There was plenty of nose inside the stadium – the Wycombe chants being led by a manic drummer at the back of the terraces who was still there banging that drum long after the final whistle. Sam Vokes, with his 64 International Caps for Wales and 113 Premier League appearances, always looked likely to be the difference between the sides, and his 3rd minute back post header from Jordan Obita’s cross proved decisive. Lincoln City played well, to give them credit, and big David Stockdale pulled off a couple of fine saves to keep the scoreline at 1-0.

Chairboys Village, Wycombe Wanderers v Lincoln City 21st August 2021
Adams Park, Wycombe Wanderers v Lincoln City 21st August 2021
Sam Vokes Goal, Wycombe Wanderers v Lincoln City 21st August 2021

After the match we walked back into town. Past the Hour Glass where my sister used to drink and my Dad play darts, then down Mill End Road where my Mum went to school. Then we followed Dashwood Avenue all the way back into town as I told Joe stories of Lord Dashwood’s Hellfire Club and showed him the place on the Avenue where we’d brought him to meet my Aunty Carol when he was just a few months old and she was in the final months of her life. Naturally our trip to Wycombe ended with a pint of Rebellion Brewery IPA in The Antelope (well Joe had to have lemonade).

  • The Hour Glass pub
  • Dashwood Avenue

Under Milk Wood

I recently spent a peaceful week in Lower Fishguard, staying in a cottage used in the film version of Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood. This meant we had a steady stream of people peeping through the lounge windows as they followed the local heritage trail.

The Pembrokeshire Coast is absolutely littered with standing stones, burial chambers and stone circles, one local told me that most fields in the area had some kind of prehistoric stone artefact in them. An archaeologist I spoke to explained that Neolithic and Bronze Age people traveled from all over Europe following the setting sun till they reached the most westerly point to bury their dead, hence the location of the numerous stone burial chambers overlooking the sea.

Garn Wen burial chamber

 

We took a family walk up the steep hill to the Garn Wen burial chambers or ‘cromlechs’ overlooking Fishguard Harbour. They were absolutely magnificient – now looking onto the back gardens of a housing estate rather than gazing out westwards across the sea. It’s interesting to think that this ‘remote’ location was so connected to continental people who would have barely stepped foot on the land of ancient Britain but who came here to bury their dead, creating a deep bond between this coastline distant lands. It’s a magical, storied landscape.

Back to Birmingham – City of Surrealists

Screening with the brilliant Video Strolls has the added bonus of a chance for a wander round Birmingham. I’ve blown through a couple of times before on tour with Russell Brand but those occasions were restricted to backstage views of venues and a quick dash through the Bull Ring searching for gifts for the family.

The occasion this time was a screening of London Overground at the Flatpack Film Festival and despite my best intentions I arrive with only an hour or so to explore. Instead of searching out new sights/sites I want to pay homage to the Birmingham Surrealists and somehow connect them to Birmingham’s Edwardian arcades.

King Edward House Birmingham

The crowds are out enjoying the sunshine pitching into New Street. There’s something about the architecture that reminds me of Downtown LA, the fading grandeur of former times. Could Ridley Scott save himself a few quid and shoot the next Blade Runner movie in the midlands, bounty hunters pursuing Replicants along the corridors of King Edward House.

Trocadero Birmingham

I stand outside the Trocadero pub in Temple Street, one of the haunts of the Birmingham Surrealists. I know the Kardomah Cafe is nearby but can’t locate the exact location until Andy Howlett takes me back there after the screening to point out the ghost sign still visible above the entrance to Hawkes and Curtis menswear shop.

Emmy Bridgwater Night work is about to commence

Emmy Bridgwater Night Work is About to Commence (1943)

I move on to the Birmingham City Gallery and Museum to find the surrealists there. The entrance is dominated by Jacob Epstein’s bronze statue of Lucifer (1944-45). After touring the galleries I find a painting by Emmy Bridgwater  Night Work is about to commence (1940-43). Bridgwater, born in Edgebaston in 1906,  was a key member of the Birmingham Surrealists along with Conroy Maddox and John Melville. It’s Melville’s Aston Villa that I spot next, painted in the year Villa won the cup, 1956.

The Victoria Birmingham

Time is moving on as it has a habit of doing when you have somewhere to be and I advance to the venue of the screening, a beautiful art deco boozer behind the Alexandra Theatre. The screening is packed and the film seems to go down well in its first outing beyond London. But once again I depart Birmingham vowing to return for more thorough exploration.

 

A Canterbury Peculiar – London Overground at the Full English Festival

Canterbury High Street

Canterbury High Street was heaving. I arrived on the midday train from Stratford International with about an hour-and-a-half before the screening of London Overground at The Gulbenkian Cinema on the University of Kent campus.

Third Eye Canterbury

A felt this Third Eye watching me as my baseball cap was blown off my head by a strong gust of wind. I went into the Oxfam bookshop a couple of doors down and a Third Eye was embossed in gold on the cover of a 1890’s book about poverty in London. Was this a message that I should be looking for some particular insight on my trip to Canterbury, or just a confluence of easy esoterica?

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The Cathedral spire poked above the rooftops of narrow medieval streets. In my mind I saw footsore pilgrims hobbling through the lanes weary from the road and for a brief period vowed to walk the Pilgrims Way from London.

count louis zborowski garage canterbury

I was quite disappointed that this interesting looking old building turned out to be the garage used by Count Louis Zborowski to build some dodgy early racing cars called ‘Chitty Bang Bang’.

Crab and Winkle Path Canterbury

Crab and Winkle Path Canterbury

The Path out of Canterbury City Centre to the University of Kent follows part of the Crab and Winkle Railway. Opened in 1830, the Whitstable to Canterbury Railway is one of the candidates for being the first railway line in Britain.

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The final stretch was across a field dominated by a large oak and then naviagting my way through the concrete cubes of the University of Kent Central Campus to the Gulbenkian Cinema.

 

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The screening of London Overground was part of the University’s Full English Festival. The festival marquee was deserted although a table covered with empty water bottles hinted at prior activity. One of my favourite films, The Wonder Boys, is set against the backdrop of University Literary Festival, there are parties and debaunchery, affairs, a stolen Marilyn Monroe jacket – Full English seemed a far more sedate affair.

London Overground Gulbenkian

I intended to leave the auditorium after introducing the film but ended up sitting in the front row and watching the first 20 minutes. It’s great to see something you’ve made projected on the big screen, memories of each shoot coming back vividly – standing on the Thames shore at Rotherhithe with Iain Sinclair and Andrew Kotting, leaving Iain’s house on a cold January night for a walk to Hampstead – and at that time not being able to imagine a moment like this sitting in a large cinema in Canterbury on a boiling hot day with people who’d come in from the sunshine to watch my film. It was a really good feeling.

University of Kent CampusWhile the film played I got a surprisingly tasty cheeseburger from the University shop and sat on a grassy bank with great views over Canterbury. Students ambled about, lounged on the grass, it was a very different scene to my student days at City Poly.

There was a good Q&A after the film, the questions almost entirely focusing on the development of London and the bleak picture of where it appears to be heading. I always try and look for some optimism but in the end we discussed the weather (it rained on nearly every walk in the film) and the experience of walking with Iain Sinclair. I mentioned our recent walk along a portion of Watling Street and the footage I’d shot with plans to shoot more, what it’ll become I’ve no idea. The next film, The Zookeeper’s Wife was due to start soon followed by Ben Wheatley’s Free Fire, so we moved out into the foyer.

I ambled back down into Canterbury with a friend for a couple pints before getting the High Speed back to Stratford.

Over the border to North Berwick

I sometimes think I don’t get out of London enough. Reflecting on the summer holiday on the train back into the Big Smoke I thought ‘I’ve been abroad 3 times – twice to England and once to Scotland’. Because leaving London is like traveling to a foreign country – the capital is a City State – an island. In Broadstairs I witnessed quaint folk traditions and swam in the sea. In Devon they almost speak a different language and everyone is old – the lady in the Nepalese restaurant spotted us as foreigners straight away although she thought we were Australian which I suppose is half right as my wife hails from Sydney.

North Berwick

But at least Scotland is a foreign country to all intents and purposes – with a proper border and a dramatically contrasting landscape to the chalk hills us southerners are accustomed to. North Berwick took us by surprise with its rugged beauty and crystal clear waters. A crab got hold of my toe and rendered me one-legged in agony for a few hours.

Tantallon Castle

We set off one day for Tantallon Castle. I’d warned the family they’d be unlikely to see the sun in Scotland (I hadn’t on 4 previous visits) but it belted down all week, especially on the day we set off along the coast with temperatures pushing 30. Bass Rock shimmered white out in the Firth of Forth – we assumed it was chalk catching the sun in the sea haze. Looking through a telescope in the castle grounds we saw that the whiteness came from a thick coating of roosting sea birds flapping their wings.

Gazing out across fields of shimmering wheat heading back into North Berwick I thought of the fields around the edge of Epping Forest – paths I’d yet to walk. I had physically left London but a part of me was still there. I picked up a copy of C.E.M Joad’s ‘A Charter for Ramblers’ and started planning future expeditions.