London has very few right angles. Its most iconic cartographic signature, that is instantly recognizable, is the river Thames. And on a map, England’s longest river slices the historic city into two (north and south), like a figure skater’s slow glides. Walking London’s streets, one gets a sense that it was designed for strolls, or playfully drawn by a traveller with no respect for time or efficiency.
London is a city best discovered on foot – with wide pavements, an excellent path marking scheme, an enormous possibility of paths and a very healthy ratio of benches to people. Hardly ever have I had to look hard for a sturdy, worn resting spot while out walking. Even more blessedly, walking or ‘rambling’ is the national pastime, the result of which is a whole compendium of unique ways to walk London.
London Park-ing
Seen from above, London is an astoundingly green city – with 3,000 parks of varying sizes, roughly a third of the city is green space. Per capita green space in London is about 31 square metres per inhabitant, compared to 18 sq m in Paris and New York. From tiny pocket parks that double up as lunch spots for office-goers to gently sprawling parks often with Japanese gardens, Victorian fountains, and lakes dotted with ducks and geese, London is a city that begs you to take a break every mile.
If you’re the kind to mark a city’s greatest’s hits, follow the easy, leisurely the Diana Princess of Wales Memorial Walk, a seven-mile circular trail (in a figure 8 pattern) that will take you past Kensington Palace, Buckingham Palace, Clarence House, St James's Palace and Spencer House. All of these should be familiar if you have been keeping up with Netflix show, The Crown! But most importantly, it gives you a grand tour of four of the eight fantastic London Royal Parks (jampacked with history, architecture, statues, memorials and cafes): St James’s Park, Green Park, Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens.
Jubilee Greenway is not for the less-than-average walker; it offers spectacular long-distance walking and cycling routes that can be done over several days. This 60 km path was built to illustrate 1 km for each year of The Queen's reign in her Diamond Jubilee year. You can walk this in bite-sized sections – one of my favourites is in east London – start from Victoria Park through Mile End Park, and finish at Limehouse basin next to the Thames; or another section which will give you a taste of London’s Little Venice, via the epic Lord’s Cricket Ground, perhaps a picnic at Regent’s Park, drop in to the London Zoo, and end at Camden Town for dinner! You can find all the paths here.
If 60 km is a bit out of your comfort zone, consider the Jubilee Walkway (14 miles of London's heartland) that is waymarked with metal discs placed at the footway of every junction that point you in the direction of travel, and gold discs which mark out special events in history – on this saunter you can tour the City Hall, Houses of Parliament, British Museum, St Paul's Cathedral, Tower of London, Tower Bridge, National Gallery, Westminster Abbey, Tate Modern, and Royal Opera House, among others. One very important tip: If you have the flexibility to choose your dates in London, I would strongly recommend you choose it to fall on Open House days (September 6-17 in 2023) – this is a fantastic time in the city, if you’re interested in architecture, heritage and history. During this time, everyone is allowed entry to charming homes, government buildings and historic sites that are usually closed to the public, and for free.
Parkland Walk is a brilliant inner-city, quick 5 km walk that snakes along a 19th century railway track that ran between Finsbury Park and Alexandra Palace, and is now London's longest local nature reserve. From wildflowers to blooming bluebells, foxes and bats to one of the best places to see ‘tunnel graffiti’ – it is a varied, and a very shaded walk made for hot summer days.
And if you have long summer days or weeks in London, and you’re tired of central London, the sweltering Tube journeys, slow-moving hordes of tourists – then I would strongly suggest you follow some of these outer London Greenways that connect the hundreds of open spaces sprinkled like brilliant green offcuts under a sewing machine.
Top Recommendation: South London Park circuits from Clapham to Nunhead Cemetery via Brockwell Park, Dulwich and Horniman Museum, or south towards Crystal Palace Park.
Walking on water
What is the original of a place? Who can be called a native in a deeply historical and dynamic city like London? Perhaps the question should be what was the original map of a place – how did it ebb and flow before we placed our own designs on it? And there is nothing that can still narrate the beginnings of a place like its waterways on which successive civilizations and cultures have stamped their palimpsests.
And London has several hidden, lost and existing watery paths that one can follow which are quite comprehensive tours by themselves.
Thames Path, as the name suggests, tracks the main aqua-artery that muscles its way through the core of London. If you’re a garden enthusiast, then you must begin at the western end and follow to scenic and iconic National Trail from Hampton Court to Radnor Gardens and onwards via Kew Gardens, a UNESCO World Heritage site. This is a superlative route to follow if you are interested in London’s historical docks (the Mayflower sailed from Rotherhithe on Thames), maritime history (the splendid, family-friendly National Maritime Museum), the Prime Meridien, and the gigantic Greenwich park down to the technological marvel, the Thames Barrier.
The full Thames path is a whopping 298 km, but a pretty achievable ‘complete river hike’ from source to end, should such an endeavour be of interest.
But the Thames isn’t the only waterway – London has a rich history of canals and lost rivers that can also be followed along; if on a short trip, I would recommend the ever-charming Regent’s Canal Walk – a nine-mile-long jaunt from Little Venice to the Thames made uniquely pleasurable with its vividly coloured moored boats, pubs, cafes and summertime greens.
Hidden rivers, too, make for fascinating walk leaders – they weave in and out of neighbourhoods and the city, they have rich underlying histories moulded by passing cultures. The Fleet River, which is the most well-known, flows from Hampstead to Blackfriars. If you’re feeling a bit jaded with north and central London, do give two river trails in South London a try – the 10-mile lost River Effra Trail and the Wandle River Walk.
A little outside London, the 15.6-mile-long Lea Valley Walk, mostly on riverside paths, is a good taster for the British countryside, marshes and rural pubs.
Many other Londons
There are a million ways to shape a city, and a million more to discover it. Should you want to venture off the ‘Hop-On-Hop-Off Bus’ route and go back with a non-Trafalgar Square souvenir, try one of the following, or, even better, devise a marked path of your own!
Walk ‘The Line’ – A five-mile permanent, public art trail with monumental sculptures all the way from Stratford to Greenwich!
‘The Magnificent Seven’ – I have a strong affinity for effaced gravestones, Victorian goth, tramping through overgrown grounds to spot graves of famous people. Is this your jam too?
Designs of the Times walk – A short, 90-minute trail via Roman temples and cathedrals, a must for architecture lovers.
And finally, the extraordinary London LOOP (London Outer Orbital Path) – the one that encircles all of Greater London measuring 150 miles broken into 24 sections. This is a mission.
Maps are manifestations of desires on geographies, and there is no better way of expressing the desire to explore a new place than by walking. Fortunately, London is a tight, complex mesh of direct and indirect paths, and no matter how you cut it, there is a slice for everyone.
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