Capital Ring Walk – Day 4
Date: 18 December 2017
Walked From: South Kenton
Walked To: Finsbury Park
Distance: 15 miles
The weather today was glorious – in a clear blue skies and winter sunshine kind of a way. Just the ticket for walking the north London section of the Capital Ring. Plus I had friends around for lunch yesterday, at which I managed to consume a huge amount of food and booze, so it made sense to walk it off…
I didn’t have high expectations of today’s route: I knew quite a lot of it was adjacent to to the North Circular (it has the dubious reputation of being the UK’s loudest road). But, perhaps because of the sunshine, it was actually really enjoyable. First up of note was Fryent Country Park (the name derives from a farm that used to be there, which was owned by a holy order of friars), then the rather lovely Welsh Harp reservoirs near Hendon, and the oddly twee Hampstead Garden Suburb, full of very well looked after handsome family-sized homes, many in that mock Tudor style that was so popular (you even see it in the US – although they just call it ‘Tudor’) in the early part of the last century.
After East Finchley I was back into some prime London walking; lovely Highgate and Queen’s woods (the latter had a cafe with a loo – there are usually still loos in the areas where wealthier Londoners live / walk their dogs. Otherwise they have all been closed because of funding cuts… perhaps less well off people don’t have to pee?) and then the fabulous Parkland Walk – London’s longest linear nature reserve no less, which follows an old railway line all the way into Finsbury Park. Another great walk exploring London.
