Walking from Becton to Crystal Palace (37km)

One of the reasons that I wanted to walk Capital Ring again was that I had not always mapped my walk (using, er, MapMyWalk) the first time so sections of it did not appear in my City Strides Life Map leaving a lot of white space in the Lewisham area.

Another reason was that I would not have gone to Woolwich if not for walking Capital Ring and I liked what I saw there, enough to want to see it again.

Capital Ring is 15 sections and 126km and my rough plan was four days of 30km each but that was a hard square to circle as the sections are of uneven lengths and SE London has two long sections (over 12km) which brought the four Sections 15 to 3 up to 37km.

I suspect that the sections are longer in SE London because of the relative lack of public transport for convenient start/end points and that certainly made this day harder than the others, it took me best part of two hours to get to the start point and more than that to get home.

Woolwich was again my highlight of the walk and I would have liked more time to explore (the app actually made me walk further than I needed to, which was a bonus!).

Woolwich is one the up and there is no greater proof of that than this collection of sculptures, Assembly by Peter Burke. There was also a trendy cafe next to it where I had a coffee and cake break.

After that it was a succession of parks and hills, none of which were particularly remarkable.

This is Oxleas Wood and, to be honest, is not the sort of view I go walk for; give me buildings any day.

The relentless stream of parks and suburban roads meant no pubs for several hours and I finally got a much needed pint in a Wetherspoons in Brixton; why Brixton and why a Spoons is a story that does not need to be told.

That only leaves three sections of Capital Ring to go and, while that is essentially home turf, I am quite looking forward to it.

The Biba Story at Fashion and Textile Museum

I was only vaguely aware of Biba at the time though the pull of its brand was enough to entice my sister up from Weymouth when she was still in her teens. Most of my awareness was to do with the branding and little to do with the fashion but the Fashion and Textile Museum has a good habit of telling interesting stories about fashion so I was keen to see this exhibition.

The simple plan for the day stumbled a little at the start as I was going to have lunch at their cafe but I forgot that it had been closed and the space converted to something else. Luckily there was plenty of choice nearby and I settled on Al’s Cafe where I rejected the option of a veggie breakfast because it came with chips and, instead went for Al's Breakfast which was much the same but without chips. It was very much a working person's cafe but the knew to do poached eggs and smashed avocado. It hit the spot perfectly and I would go there again.

As usual, Fashion and Textile Museum crammed quite a lot into a fairly small space and it was a slow walk around the exhibition looking at all of the garments (it was mostly garments) and reading the stories behind them.

The fashion exhibitions that I usually see, mostly at V&A, are on high-end fashion, e.g. Alexander McQueen, and in contrast to that I found most of the fashion uninspiring, though it was interesting to see some very period outfits. A lot looked like they could have come from M&S but that probably tells you more about what I know about fashion than it does about Biba.

Amongst the fairly average dresses and suits were a few stunning outfits. My favourite was a unisex trouser suit which a psychedelic pattern and widely flared trousers. I like to think that I have the courage to wear something like that. There was also a spider dress, so called because it looked as though it was covered in webbing, that was distinctly glamorous.

Biba's style changed quite a bit over the years and the texts listen all sorts of influences so there was little commonality across the outfits other than they were designed for tall thin women with few curves.

It was a fashion exhibition so while it mentioned the designs of the various shops there was only one photo of one and I do not recall reading anything about the production process, other than the sourcing of fabrics. The high turn-over of designs suggests something like today's fast fashion but that was an untold story.

On nice thing about the exhibition was that many people had clearly dressed for the occasion and the visitors were almost as interesting as the exhibits. One was even wearing a Biba trouser suit and I took the opportunity to say how much I admired it.

My simple metric for exhibitions is how long I spend there and this one occupied me for all but an hour which, given the size of the venue, was quite an achievement.

Walking from Hendon to Becton (33km)

My aim of walking Capital Ring for a second time took a good step forward with another four sections, 11 to 14, taking me from Hendon to Becton.

The walk was something of a mixed bag for me as I have walked parts of this several times, including the somewhat long and dull section starting south of Olympic Park.

I also took a different route through Highgate Woods from the last time and I failed to find the nice cafe there. I took the easy option and made up for this my going to the cafe in Finsbury Park and having their all-day veggie breakfast, not for the first time.

There were some highlights and I liked walking through the new development on the lakes at Woodberry Down. I also enjoyed the slight detour through Middlesex Filer Beds Nature Reserve thanks to the industrial remains. Previously I had always continued along River Lee and I do not know how official the detour is regarding Capital Ring but I am glad I took it.

The stop for the veggie breakfast through y schedule and after almost six and a half hours I called it a day; I was tempted to do Section 15 too but I had to get home and leave it for another day, another day soon.

Grayson Perry: The Vanity of Small Differences

While I have enjoyed all of the Grayson Perry art that I have stumbled across at places like V&A I had never gone to one of his exhibitions before but this one was so easy to get to, just a simple 65 bus ride, so it would have been strange not to go. The extensive research I did beforehand told me that the exhibition was six large-scale tapestries, which was enough to get me to part with £6.60 (thanks to the Art Fund discount).

The venue was Pitzhanger Manor Ealing, a place I know well because I spend a lot of time in Walpole Park and the several other parks in that area. I had even been to the cafe there but that was the only place inside that I had been to; another good reason for going.

If I had done even the slightly bit more research I would have been even keener to go as The Vanity of Small Differences was inspired by William Hogarth’s A Rake’s Progress and the original paintings were bought by the wife of the architect of Pitzhanger, Sir John Soane, to be displayed at Pitzhanger. 

opens at Pitzhanger Manor & Gallery this July–December 2024. For the first time, this exhibition brings the Turner-Prize-winning artist’s six large-scale tapestries to a building where William Hogarth’s A Rake’s Progress, the inspiration behind Perry’s tapestries, were purchased for and displayed. The tapestries were most definitely at home.

For a description of the exhibition, I can do better than quote from the "Taking Hogarth’s famed series as a starting point, Perry’s tapestries depict a corresponding fable of class, taste and social mobility. Weaving the complex ‘class journey’ of the fictional protagonist, Tim Rakewell.".

This is just part of one of the tapestries and you can see how rich the picture is in symbolism; they make a big impact at a distance because of their size and colours and then as you get closer there is more and more to see. Each tapestry takes a little time to study and enjoy.

No spoilers, but the last tapestry is in a darkened room on its own with a content warning at the entrance.

I really enjoyed the exhibition and, as my sister wants to see it too, I will be seeing it again soon.

Walking from Richmond to Hendon (34km)

I walked Capital Ring a few years ago and I wanted to walk it again for various reasons including just for the enjoyment of the route and to record all of the route on MapMyWalk so that it would be in my CityStrides LifeMap. It annoyed me that I had not always mapped the route when I did it before leaving some notable orbital gaps in my LifeMap.

I got a nudge when Go Jauntly created a challenge to complete Capital Ring on their app. I like the Go Jauntly app and have done a few of their challenges and this gave me the opportunity to try it out on some routes, which is the main point of it.

The final nudge came from the monthly British Czech and Slovak Association social in West Hampstead. I usually walk to this and have taken ad hoc routes via Greenford before so it was easy to pick a route that followed Capital Ring most of the way.

My original, possibly overly ambitious plan, was to walk Sections 7 to 10 of Capital Ring, Richmond to Osterley Lock to Greenford to South Kenton to Hendon Park, and then walk on to West Hampstead. On the day I left home later than hoped so having done the four sections I took public transport the last few miles. 

In the end I was only half an hour late for the start of the social which I celebrated with a very quick pint of Pilsner Urquell.

The point of trying Go Jauntly is that it has a map that you can easily follow on your phone. The first time I did Capital Ring I was reading the text instructions on a PDF file on my iPad while also trying to follow a map on Google Maps that someone else had created. It was cumbersome work checking both and they did not always agree. We got off track regularly. 

Google Maps should have worked but it kept forgetting that I was using the Capital Ring map and I was constantly reloading it and then zooming back to the section I was on. Useful in case of emergencies but not really good enough for constant use.

The Go Jauntly maps worked very well.

This is the map of Section 8 and you can see how clear it is. I usually worked around this level of zoom but in the few more complex areas, such as crossing a major road, I zoomed right in to check that I was in the correct place.

At all times the familiar blue dot showed where I was so there was never any question of wandering too far off the route and any errors I made were quickly corrected.

The one thing I did have to get used to is that the map is a series of straight lines between waypoints and the paths sometimes wiggled quite a way from those lines. That was never a big problem as all I was doing was following an obvious path as it curved towards the next waypoint. 

Again, any confusion was quickly resolved by zooming right in to confirm that the path (shown on the map) did indeed head towards the desired waypoint.

One nice surprise was that Go Jauntly recognised when I had finished a section and automatically updated the challenge.

The walk gave me the first four of the fifteen badges needed to complete this challenge.

The big bonus was that following the route was easy and so I spent much less time looking at my phone and more looking at the scenery. 

I did not bother looking out for Capital Ring signs either, relying solely on the digital map. On previous walks that had been a bit of an issue as the uncertainty over the PDFs and Google Maps meant that I was often looking for the reassurance of an official sign.

Og course I only have Go Jauntly's word that their version of Capital Ring is the same as the official one but I was deliberately doing the Go Jauntly version so I was not worried about any differences or discrepancies

The walk itself was fun, even though the first half of the route, as far as Greenford, was very familiar. It had been (mostly) dry for some time and so all the paths were easy to walk; a few brambles here and there but very little mud.

I did have to take a detour around Paradise Fields in Greenford as that was heavily fenced off to protect the recently reintroduced beavers.

Across the road from there was Horsenden Hill and the first steep climb of the day. I do most of my walking in inner London where hills are almost non-existant and it is always something of a shock to the system when I venture further afield and have to climb. I still haven't quite got used to the fact that place names that contain "hill" are clues to be respected.

The 34km took me almost 6.5 hours, which is just over 5km/hour; not bad considering the hills and the condition of some of the paths.

Overall I call that a success and I plan to continue the Capital Ring challenge with Go Jauntly.

Banksy in Kew

Hearing that Banksy had done a drawing by Kew Bridge was an opportunity that I was not going to miss and I had the opportunity to see it very quickly as I was meeting friends in that area, all I had to do was stay on the bus for a few more stops.

There was a decent crowd there all doing the same thing, having their photos taken with the Banksy behind them; so I joined in.