Lwalks.London

Back on the rails

It has been a long time since I posted, for various reasons. Apart from sheer laziness, though, I have been hard at work on the “railway days out” set of walks. I had been holding back until I revisited walks which had not been done for some time before writing them up. I then had another birthday and decided on a different tack. I went back to my maps and wrote up the routes, gaining help in spotting changes from the maps themselves and from online resources.

**Looking west from Charlton, Northamptonshire**

I then grouped the walks by their London terminus (or group of termini) and created eight documents to cover the fifty walks. Rather than use photographs from my library wherever I could, I have presented these documents with photos for recently checked walks, and without for those requiring a check-up. That way, you will be able to follow any of the routes, with a bit more caution for those without photos. Meanwhile, I shall do my best to check and edit more walks, with photos being added. Of course, any route may need to be changed as things happen in the landscape, from new housing to cliff erosion.

TfL routes upgraded

After another marathon, I have now revised and upgraded the route descriptions for my TfL routes —following the DLR, Elizabeth Line, Overground, trams, Underground rail lines, and the Superloop bus routes. All sections now begin on a recto, for ease of printing off a section. Twenty-two documents.

The Three Circuits — further revision

***Battersea Power Station station, on the Ring around the Underground***

I have been working on some new routes in and around London, which necessitated visiting various points on the three long-distance circuit walks, the Coal Tax Circuit, the London Summits Walk, and the Ring around the Underground, so I buffed the guides up with new-found knowledge. The biggest change has been to simplify the part of the Coal Tax Circuit between Colnbrook and Staines-upon-Thames, ditching the eastern option which had more hard surface and sharp thorns than the western option, but there has been other tinkering on all three routes.

For ease of printing off sections of the routes, I have arranged for each section to start on a recto. The new PDF documents have replaced the old ones

After I clear some other commissions, I should be back on the routes, southbound from Woolwich.

Walk local — Harefield Healthwalks

Over the winter and through the spring, I put together a set of walks in and around Harefield to chime in with the Heart and Lung initiative at the Harefield Practice, in conjunction with the hospital next door. There is now a set of fourteen walks, ranging from 1.2km to 15.3km (don’t worry, the longer ones may be broken up at bus stops along the way), on streets, lanes and towpaths, and over parkland, farmland and woodland.

The webpage has a link to an accompanying document which gives gives full details with photographs.

Completing the TfL set

***Dial House, Royal Arsenal, Woolwich*** (SL03)

After a longer pause than I should have liked, the Superloop walking routes have been completed to round out the TfL set.

These routes provide a mix of urban, rural and parkland walking. They cover

the seven orbital routes, creating a circuit from North Finchley via Walthamstow, Woolwich, Bromley, Croydon, Heathrow and Harrow
the three radial routes outwards to Bromley, Croydon and Uxbridge

The routes do not follow the buses slavishly from stop to stop, balancing closeness to the buses with places of walking interest.