4 West Ham to North Woolwich

Saturday May 30, 2009:

I stand in front of the so-called super-loo outside West Ham station and growl. It’s eaten my companion’s ten pence and remains resolutely shut to all-comers. I’m dying for a pee! Grumbling, I trail after my companion onto the Greenway, where abandoning all thoughts of modesty I retreat to the middle of a small meadowed verge to relieve myself.

It is an absolutely glorious day! The sun shines, the sky is clear bar a few little wispy clouds. There is a lovely cooling breeze and we have the world to ourselves, or so it seems. Hurrah for the F.A. Cup final!

On the banks of the walk, someone has planted a range of native plants and grasses. Strips of flower-strewn meadows are flanked, first on one side and then on both by tangling profusions of pink and white dog roses, lifting their frail petals to the sun. This is absolutely their time of the year!

I breathe deeply. Behind the faint sour sewerage aroma dances the rosy leafy sweet top-notes of the meadow flowers. Above us, at decent intervals from each other, blackbirds are belting out their glorious song. My grumpiness forgotten, I bow and smile at the golden cascades of song as we stride purposely forth.

We pass terrace houses, a grotty looking estate, and more houses. We’re quite high up for a while but when the houses on one side level with us, they are small and a little down at heal. Despite the singing blackbirds, the cheerful dog roses, the dancing meadow strips with their nodding tender wild flowers, the softness of the air, I feel the struggle of communities trying to make ends meet. we’re walking through the heart of the poor East End. Here, poverty and disadvantage sit side by side with hopeful regeneration via the Olympic development not far away. Small but heart lifting gestures of greening such as that of the Northern Output Sewerage Effluent (or NOSE) pipe upon which we walk stretch thin green fingers amongst the shabby dwellings with their insubstantial little gardens and grim balconies. I wonder if their inhabitants ever walk this green line.


I’m tired, so we sit down, our backs against a rusty barred fence and listen to the birds. The “Woodpigeons, tits and wrens compete with the ubiquitous noisy blackbirds. I stroke the soft grasses, gather up the tenderest most velvety of them to make a small bouquet to tuck behind my left ear (where all such tributes sit best!). We are alone, bar a curious jogger whose swift glance, my companion informs me, holds curiosity. No doubt, she wonders what on earth we want to sit down on top of a sewer pipe for. I imagine we are sitting in a meadow far away from East London, and am happy.

In time, we move. My companion spies a peacock butterfly rising from the sweet meadow. We pass more houses, more dog-roses and some small industrial sites. Since West Ham, we’ve crossed about five roads which intersect the Greenway. We turn off now down a ramp festooned with cultivated and wild flowers into a small housing estate.

Here, the houses show individuality, a legacy of the Right to buy opportunities of Thatcher’s Britain. Young Asian men pass us, talking loudly on their mobiles. We turn towards the roaring A13 over which we have now to pass to reach the next finger of green.

The metal bridge trembles beneath our feet as we walk quickly across it. On the other side, we pass the sign to Beckton Alps (a dry-ski complex) and turn down a road beside some houses towards Beckton District Park. At the opening, stands a lone young police officer guarding a stretch of black and yellow “Scene of Crime” tape.

“Is there a dead body behind there?” asks my companion pruriently.
“I’m afraid I can’t comment”, the police officer replies dryly. We walk on leaving her to guard her frail barrier against the curious and ghoulish.

Circling a lake in futile search of a cup of tea, we encounter the Beckton District Park toilets, which are a disgrace to behold! Not for the first time I’m glad not to be able to see, if the smell is anything to go by. Trying not to breathe, we scurry outside quickly.

Under the benevolent noonday sun, we settle ourselves on a bench by the lake. The chocolate we share is the consistency of blue-tac . Nevertheless, it is delicious and just what is needed. As we rest, Canada Geese importune us aggressively. Clearly, human sitting on bench means dinner! I honk back at them and quack cheerfully at the ducks dabbling about in the lake beyond.

Wood pigeons swoop and raise their wings scirring the air insistently. Amongst them, my companion tells me, a smaller completely white pigeon with pink markings about the eyes hops about. An albino pigeon perhaps, or more likely a little white dove! Ah, I think and coo at it softly.

We walk on. The park is long and narrow and soon bisected by a road. Beyond this, it is wilder. Small stands of trees shade the path, tangled undergrowth at their ankles. Now on either side lie stretches of meadow, dotted with wild flowers. In the middle of a sunny patch sits a young woman and her black and white dog, both peacefully basking in the sun. For a moment, I contemplate joining her but am drawn on by my companion’s cry of delight as she spies the first of a number of tethered horses.

The smell of them dances to us on the breeze, warm, heavy and brown, pungent, yet sweet. The horses are tethered and patiently stand in sun or shade quietly observing the day, their empty feed buckets lying toppled and abandoned at their feet.

“Hello” I say to a docile mare who allows me to stroke her velvety nose. She breathes back at me and lets me pet her. We stand together in the dappled shade and commune.

Insects buzz about busily, the humming city disappears beyond the sighing trees and the whispering grass. Soft horse breath on my arm, like the tenderest of kisses, brings a smile to my face and I remember Epona the horse goddess. Caught in a moment of lazy peacefulness that comes when standing with horses at rest, I blow through loose lips and the horse blows back.

But we have to move on. I feel the horses following us with their eyes as we walk through a stand of scrubby trees and across another road. Here , the parkas reverted to municipal order.

Beyond the children’s playground, another horse stands and whinnies; for she has spied someone she knows. An old man tells us the horse is called April and she is his. We stand stroking the horse and tell him of our walk. He tells us of the joys of “RedRovering ” in his youth and then shambles off, horse in tow to watch the football.

We walk on. I fantasise allowed about man and horse settling down together in front of the telly. I imagine them with steaming cups (or in the case of the horse, a bowl) of tea, companionably enjoying the match.

New Beckton Park, fringed by houses is almost deserted. It is neat and pleasant. Here the Ring deviates from the book. But there are helpful signs so we negotiate our way round a closed gate on the edge of a small estate and turn onto the main road. We skirt the East London University campus and head towards the river.

The road is busy. We cross two fingers of water or “reaches”, and follow the signs leading us between uninspiring blocks of flats with forbidding balconies. On a wall, a small sign tells us that to find “Michelle’s beauty” turn left. For good measure, Michelle has obligingly left her phone number. We speculate about what services she could be offering and to whom and walk on.

At last we come to the river, beyond a concrete wall. The water stretches out emptily, shimmering silver in the bright sunlight. We flop down onto an uncomfortable metal bench and feast briefly on cheesy oatcakes and nuts and raisons.

The river walk and its environs are deserted. Over in far away Woolwich, an ice-cream van’s chimes peal out tantalisingly. Dead leaves scuttle down the road in front of us like bashful toddlers running an egg and spoon race. I imagine them as they skitter past, some fast, some trailing behind, a group followed by a poor straggler, alone and desolate, red faced and tearful. Just when I think the race has ended, another leave skips by, desperately trying to catch up. Idiotically, I want to reach out a finger and edge it forward, to lighten its load in some way.

“It’s a bit like one of those Sci-Fi films where bustling busy London has been emptied of humanity and only we and the scuttling leaves are left.” I say to my companion. “Except, we’re glad to have the city to ourselves,” I add, picking a cashew nut out of the little container in my hand and popping it into my mouth.

“We’ve probably got quite a bit more to do,” says my companion as she scoops the last nuts out of the pot. WE climb to our feet and head west.

We are in the land of the gated community. We walk along the river, heading towards North Woolwich and the Woolwich Ferry. ON another unforgiving hard metal bench, someone lies sunbathing, on one or two balconies, other figures, as still as statues watch the dancing river. Some rather pleasant African music saunters out from an open window. For a moment, I think I can hear a clear tenor voice singing along. The wind shifts and the sounds melt into the city rumble.


We find an unlocked gate and walk through. A boat slipway gives direct access to the water’s edge. Two mallards waddle in front of us as we carefully negotiate the rough concrete. They launch themselves into the river with a flurry of feathers and a fair bit of flapping. I think how nice it would be to do the same.

The silvery water begins to tremble agitatedly as a huge barge approaches. The lapping is drown by the growling roar of its engine. We step back from the river edge to avoid the barge’s tumbling wake and the threat of wet feet.

The Earnest Bevin ferry cleaves the water as it heads across the river. Behind it the water tumbles noisily. We walk past a broken down pier and my companion comments on it’s similarity with the West Pier in Brighton.

We turn into a riverside park. The city’s not deserted. The park is dotted about with groups of adults and children picnicking in the sunshine. A mother calls a toddler to order; across the grass, another child wails and is soothed in a language which is not English. We walk on, tired now for our journey is almost at its end.

The DLR is not working. WE climb aboard a replacement rail service and rock our way through the East End to Canary Warf and home. My feet are sore and my arms feel suspiciously warm. I have caught the sun – how nice that sounds! My arms are sunburnt just in the place where I would have hugged the sun!

I think about the gloriously singing blackbirds, the companionable horses, the warmth of the day and the soft breeze and the gentle sound of the river lapping against the hard concrete bank. What a city of contrasts, swathes of concrete interspersed with fingers of green. The peace is embraced by the hubbub and the hubbub is framed by the green.

“When I get home, I say to my companion as we climb stiffly from the bus, “I’m going to sit in the garden with my feet in a bowl of warm warder and drink a nice cup of Lady Gray tea. ”.