A bunch of us met at Greenwich by the tunnel on Sunday morning, just as the rain cleared for blue sky and sun to accompany us. As seems usual these days, the north lift was out of action again, but all sixteen of us managed to get our bikes up the stairs and thence to the riverside.
The sky was blue, the sun was bright, but that wind was, shall we say brisk. If there is a wind, you’ll feel it double riding into it, by the river. But our beautiful riverside is worth a bit of work, and once we headed away from the Thames through Limehouse basin to the canal, the breeze dropped completely.
Up the Regent canal, always interesting, past the barges, soft earthy smells of woodsmoke from their smoking stoves. Early enough not to be too busy with joggers, strollers and daft dogs. Then, our first stop, my old favourite, Lock 7, where you can watch bike mechanics at work while you sup good coffee and munch your fresh croissant. Which is my idea of the perfect Sunday breakfast. YMMV, I know!
Then back down to the canal as far as Islington where we paused a while to wait for stragglers and consider just how tough those old bargees must have been to power those barges through that tunnel while their horses were taken up above.
We left the canal to head through attractive Georgian Myddleton Square to Clerkenwell, where we viewed the ancient Clerk’s Well, oddly visible still through the glass window of some anonymous office building. Then on, to see what is left of one of London’s old Italian quarters, including St Peter’s Church with its poignant memorial to the SS Arandora Star on which perished over 700 Italian internees when it was torpedoed during the Second World War. Poignant, because the vast majority of these people were not dangerous fascists, but working class Italians, many of whom had lived in Britain for decades, some who were even born here.