Walking 15km from Gunnesbury to Rayners Lane

This walk was something of an experiment.

I wanted to walk in some new places in a linear route directed by Go Jaunty and my companion wanted to walk around 10 miles (yes, he still uses miles) and I quickly arrived at this route from the almost over-familiar Gunnesbury to the never-visited Rayners Lane.

I let Go Jaunty plan the route. I had used its route planner (it does lots of other things) before but only on short routes which had worked well but were not much of a test. I was using Go Jauntly because it has a "Green Route" option whereas Apple Maps, Google Maos, etc. just do shortest routes.

The new route was a quick success taking me along ia path I did not know about in a part of Ealing that I had walked through several times. 

And that set the tone for the next couple of hours which were a pleasing mix of quiet paths and lush parks. Everything was wonderful, until Greenford.

In Greenford we struggled to find a cafe and had to settle for a Costa in a shopping mall. After that we spent a lot of time following main roads because there were no paths and few parks (one!) in the area. At least we we were still doing steps and distance.  

Overall the walk was a big success and I enjoyed it a lot. More importantly, Go Jauntly passed this test with flying colours and it is now my first choice app for route planning.

Pink Floyd at Pompeii MCMLXXII

I have no idea why someone thought to update 1972's Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii in 2025, missing the fiftieth anniversary in doing so, but I welcomed the chance to see it again, this time on a big screen with big loudspeakers.

To save travel time, I chose to go to the Odeon in Kingston and duly paid £25 for my seat. There was some confusion on the day as it was moved to another screen, technical problems, and I ended up in the back row (K) of Screen 4, which was fine.

I am pretty sure that I bought Live at Pompeii at some point in some format now defunct , probably VHS, so I had not seen it for quite a few years and while I could remember some of the songs included I knew that there were gaps in my memory.

They opened with Echos which was an excellent start. A live version of Echos is on my iPhone and I play it several times a year. The sound quality was as good as expected and the video was as good as I should have expected which was good for its time but seriously behind today's standard. That did not matter though, I was there for the songs and they were great.

This was 1972 and Pink Floyd played a selection of their then most known songs including classics like Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun, Careful with That Axe, Eugene, and A Saucerful of Secrets. They also played Mademoiselle Nobs!

Despite being described as "live" with some post production work in the studio the songs sounded very much like their studio versions, which was again fine.

The film did little other that show the band and the only surprising thing about that was the amount of time spent on Nick Mason who impressed with his casual virtuosity. There were also a few scenes of the band in the studio talking which did not add much except that it gave us a glimpse in to the genesis of Dark Side of the Moon which would change their world for ever and have a big impact on lots of other people too.

As a film, Pink Floyd at Pompeii was not great and was rescued by the copious amounts of music which made it a good experience of any Pink Floyd fan, like me.

Neil Young Coastal

The only question on the Neil Young Coastal film was where to see it and I opted for the comfort of Olympic Cinema in Barnes where my comfy seat cost me a reasonable £18.5. 

The film was taken on the road during his 2023 solo tour and featured some travel time in his electric bus, some backstage scenes and a decent amount of concert footage. It was all filmed by Neil's wife, Daryl Hannah , and in monochrome. It very much had a home video feel to it and there is nothing wrong with that, in particular the conversations Neil had with his driver were clearly genuine and while they were rarely deep they were also interesting.

The concert footage, which is what I think most people went to see the film for, was interesting for several reasons; there were none of the "greatest hits", a phrase Neil himself used and instead it was mostly new songs, i.e. ones I did not recognise. One song I did recognise was Vampire Blues, from On The Beach (1974), which I had never head Neil play live before.

I am not sure how deliberate it was but over the relatively few songs played Neil used a lot of different instruments and he told us stories about a couple of them, indeed he seemed quite chatty on stage.

Being a documentary of a solo artist playing unknown songs it was all rather low-key. Luckily that artist was Neil Young and he was playing typical Neil Young songs so everything was good. I bought a ticket for his Hyde Park show the next day.

How to Fight Loneliness at Park Theatre

That I have a tag on this blog for Neil Labute (labute) is a good clue that I like his plays. I also have a Google Alert set for "labute london" and it was that which alerted me to the first UK production of How to Fight Loneliness at Park Theatre.

I got in quickly and secured a front row seat (A7) for £29.5.

I made the most of the opportunity of going back to Finsbury to get a few steps and a few new roads in before the show. I caught the Mildmay line to Hampstead Heath and walked from there.

I arrived in good time to eat beforehand which was just as well as two of the places that I had eaten at pre-theatre there before were closed, probably permanently.

Luckily Park Theatre has a bar that does pizzas and while the range is small they do an Artichoke & Olive (£12.45) which did the job. The pint of beer that I his with it was good too. And having pre-booked seats (unlike in their smaller space) I was able to sit in the upstairs bar area enjoying both until summoned to take my seat.

Anything I might have known about the play beforehand was forgotten and I took my seat ready to discover what was going on.

We meet a young couple, Brad and Jodie (thirty-something I would guess), at home fretting about an expected visitor and whether the right food and drinks etc. were available but also whether they themselves were ready for the meeting.

Soon Tate arrives and the situation becomes clear to us.

Jodie has been on several rounds of chemotherapy and now wants to die before she becomes frail and bedridden.

Brad had agreed to this plan reluctantly and wants Jodie to change her mind and live.

Tate has been chosen as a possible means of assisting her death, for a reason that is explained later.

And that is kind of it, the three of them talk about whether the deed should be done, how it could be done and whether Tate is the right person to do it.

Except, of course, that is not it.Neil Labute plays are filled with meaningful dialogue that usually gets dark and twisty, as it does here.

It is hard to describe the play as fun but it is thoroughly fascinating and engaging. It also gives some perspectives on assisted dying that are relevant given the current debate on this in the UK.

Making the dialogue work was a strong cast in which Morgan Watkins excelled as Tate. I loved his restlessness, his constant movement and frequent adjustments to his cap and jacket.

The staging worked well too with the scene shown above acting as both a living room and a beach with just a few prop changes.

How to Fight Loneliness is very much in the established Neil Labute mould so if you like his other work you will like this. I loved it!

Hampton Court Palace and Gardens (14 Apr 25)

I have been a member of Historic Royal Palaces for a few years mostly because Hampton Court is close by (half an hour by bus, under an hour to walk) and also because my two sons live close to Tower of London. As with Kew Gardens, I use my membership to make multiple short visits often as part of a longer walk.

The excuse this time was the annual tulip festival.

Arriving just on 11am meant it was coffee and cake time which gave a good structure to the visit with the cafe at the north end of the extensive gardens and the formal beds at the south end, A pleasant stroll through the busy side garden, the one that leads on to Home Park, led to the magnificent view of the frontage facing the river and the largest of the formal gardens.

Next to the large formal garden is another glorious garden kept delightfully pristine and peaceful by not allowing visitors inside.

 

Throughout the gardens there were stunning borders to savour. This one is also on the south side, towards the end of my short tour, and there were similar displays in several other places.

I was at Hampton Court for a couple of hours, all of which was spent in the gardens or the cafe. It was a couple of hours very well spent and I will be going back for more soon.

The Merchant of Venice 1936 at Richmond Theatre

Most plays at Richmond Theatre interest me and most performances of anything by Shakespeare do too so the combination of both was unmissable. 

As usual, there was an ATG opening night offer and so I was able to get seat Upper Circle A12 for just £31.5. However, on the night the Upper Circle was closed, presumably because of low sales (for some shows they make no attempt to open the upper level), and I got bumped up to Dress Circle B6. Luckily there was no one tall in row A.

I had not had the opportunity to see The Merchant of Venice for many years and most of what I remembered was from school days. Because of that I do not know how much of a shift they made in moving it to England in 1936 when Mosley's Blackshirts were rampant.

I suspect that quite a bit was cut, to give more prominence to Shylock but this is just a suspicion and most of the text of this play was most definitely Shakespeare.

I understand why they set the play when and where they did but to end with the populous standing up for the Jews jarred a little when Shylock had refused any amount of money to save Antonio who was portrayed as an honourable fascist.

The messing about aside, this was a good Shakespeare with a good cast in which Joseph Millson shone as Antonio. Everything about the performance was good enough to let me forget the updating and to simply enjoy one of Shakespeare's more notable plays.

Walking 15km from Sloane Square to Canada Water

My preference for walking is to go from A to B where A and B are easy to get to by public transport, B is some distance away, and the bit in the middle includes as much new territory as possible. 

My walking companion prefers parks and familiarity. This walk was an attempt to do both.

We started at Sloane Square because we can get there by tube for free from 9am and ended at Canada Water because that took us across south London which is not our usual territory and also through Burgess Park which is more familiar.

The direct route was not that long so I took us south first and after I made him walk down a previously unwalked road in Chelsea we crossed the river into Battersea Park, probably my favourite London Park.

From there it was largely a question of me trying to persuade my colleague to walk down unwalked roads without making it obvious that we were avoiding the obvious route.

I really enjoyed seeing new parts of London such as the grand houses in Stockwell Park not that far from an enormous new development of identikit flats.

One highpoint was coming across a large mural at a school which had a touch of Niki de Saint Phalle about it and even better was finding the artist there just finishing it off so I was able to pass on my admiration for it. 

Unfortunately I did not pause to take a photo of that mural but I did remember to do so later on and this mural is in St James's Road, Bermondsey which we passed towards the end of our jaunt.

My preference for walking is to go from A to B precisely because of walks like this one.

Dear Evan Hansen at New Wimbledon Theatre

When Dear Evan Hansen first hit the London stage a few years ago I heard good things about it and when this tour was announced late in 2023 the promotional blurb explained that it was "THE OLIVIER, TONY and GRAMMY AWARD-WINNING BEST MUSICAL". That attracted my attention.

My ATG+ membership gave me a great deal on the first night at New Wimbledon Theatre so in November 23 I paid just £29 for my seat Dress Circle A17. Friends and relatives were also tempted by the deal and I took bought the maximum four tickets allowed.

When we arrived at the theatre, just after 7pm, and joined the messy series of queues to get in we saw the "House Full" signs which boosted out expectations for the evening even further. Full of hope we took our excellent seats in the best part of the house and waited for the show to start.

I hated it. We all did.

The story was vaguely interesting and the set was very good, particularly the scene changes, but the characters were superficial, the music was  bland, all the songs sounded the same and the singing was only competent.

I struggle to find anything positive to say about it, other than it was better than Six.