A day of walking

I had little option other than to walk all day and so I chose a good way to do it.

I had to be at St George's Hospital in Tooting for 10:20 and at a bar in West Hampstead at 6pm which meant I either had to waste time getting home then going out again or I could simply walk an elongated route in the time available.

And getting to St George's meant two short walks of around half an hour first from home to Norbiton Station then from Wimbledon Station to the hospital. By the time I started the main walk I had done about 6km.

The walk from St George's to West Hampstead was dictated by CityStrides and was in two parts. Firstly it was long straight roads in areas I rarely walk south of the river then lots of meandering north of the river where I have walked many times and was looking to tick off as many new roads as possible.

I had no specific route in mind, other then to keep heading vaguely north but not to do so too quickly, and I used the CityStrides app to plan each 10 to 15 minute segment by looking at the roads ahead and seeing which ones I had not walked before, conveniently shown on the map as a series of red dots that I needed to walk through.

Choosing the route this way took me though some interesting places mostly, as you can probably guess from the map, quite well to do ones and I do like looking at grand buildings (even if the wealth they represent came from exploitation and theft, as all wealth does).

There was also plenty of other interesting things to see, particularly street art. I was walking not sight-seeing and the only thing I stopped to photograph was this stunning art. This is only part of the black and white drawing which extends a fair way to the left.

I had two breaks along the way, a superb brunch at Reyes a little north of Clapham Junction and a fair coffee and cake at Toast Cafe in Little Venice.

 

I kept an eye on the remaining distance to West Hampstead so I knew with some certainty how long it would take me to get there and I duly arrived just before 6pm for a well deserved pint in the recently refurbished The Railway. I had a further four pints later in Bohemia House at the monthly BCSA Get to Know You Social, my reason for going to West Hampstead in the first place.

The statistics do not really tell the story but, for the record, the walk was 35km and took me something over 7 hours, including breaks. I deserved those beers!