Sun beams poking through the clouds on Hampstead Heath, London.
A hand-drawn map of some of London’s secret gardens. A bit pointless for me as I live in Kenya right now. Perhaps something for the future. This was drawn by Kathryn from Trip Stylist, a company that collects together London’s lesser-known gems and quirky bits of history into ready-made and tailored day out guides and self-guided walking tours.
Six Peaks
The idea started as a six peak challenge. Rather than the real six peaks of Great Britain (potentially fun, but strenuous and costly), we thought about six peaks of London: beautiful places with beautiful views of London. We visited a bunch, mapped them (see here), and ended up choosing three (rather than six, more through laziness than anything else).
The aim was an activity at each peak. Starting at Telegraph Hill Upper Park, where we ate lunch, played a bit of scrabble and had a good old traditional egg and spoon race. Then off to One Tree Hill, via Nunhead Cemetery, which is a vast and beautifully overgrown hidden treasure of London. Here, we were fortunate to get a spooky tour of the Crypt, from the Friends of Nunhead Cemetery. Next, was One Tree Hill where there are amazing trees and lots of edible fruits. After snacks and cider, we headed through Peckham Park and up to Franks Bar, which is on top of the Multiplex Car Park, where there was a surprise orchestra and incredible sunset over the London skyline! A perfect day.
Here’s the route and some photos:
Every now and then, we take over a lovely little shop called Bermondsay Fayre in South London, and put on a pop-up folk night where artists and friends perform their poetry and songs. It’s cosy, very intimate and fun!
This was our second pop-up folk event, organized by the Borough Common Church, raising money for Macmillan. The video above is Ali Mackenzie. I’ve also uploaded a bunch of photos on Flickr from the event.
Yesterday I went to my favourite place in London - Kew Gardens. It’s a wonderland of plants, trees and other wonderful species from all over the world. It also does vital conservation research.
Favourite spots are the Madagascan palm tree - that was about to outgrow the palm house but instead started producing a beautiful chandelier-like flower last year, which also signals it is at the end of it’s life before dying. The incredible orchid displays are also a favourite and last year I remember, in particular, the Madagascar Star Orchid, which Darwin took great interest in, proposing that a pollinator must exist somewhere which would have a very long-tongue to pollinate it. This moth did indeed exist, although it wasn’t discovered for another 40 years! Finally the trees are just stunning and if you can’t make it to Kew, you can get a tiny flavour of what’s there on Google Street View.
I was reminded yesterday of the critically endangered Wollemi Pine that sits in a cage under lock-and-key. It was odd to see a tree surrounded by a cage and after visiting the People and Plants exhibition, I was really struck again at our complete dependence on nature, and how even our everyday choices of what we buy influence the natural world. If you’ve never been to Kew, do try to go. My top tip is to make use of the daily free tours. They show you lots of stuff you would otherwise miss.
The best pubs in London
It’s so cold outside, so when stuck in Central London, it’s handy to know where to find a good Samuel Smith pub, and a chap called James Gretton has delivered a fine mapping service to help us wondering souls. Apart from bearing such a splendid name, three handy things to know about these fine pubs are:
- All beer is vegan (with the exception of the Old Brewery Bitter) - apparently, most beer brewed in the UK is not technically suitable for vegetarians or vegans
- They still deliver multiple-trip (re-usable) bottles in beer crates
- They removed all music, televisions and branding from their pubs
Just the right ingredients for a good time.
