Another lovely spring day, warm, sunny and no wind. We walked for miles and miles along canal paths today.

We started in Paddington Basin which is only 5 minutes from our hotel. The Paddington Arm of the Grand Union Canal, constructed in 1801, terminated in a 4 acre stretch of water called Paddington Basin. The basin was situated on a major road and hence was a busy transhipment facility for the supply of goods from the Midlands to London. Since 2000 the basin has been the centre of a major redevelopment and is surrounded by modern office buildings and apartments. Paddington Basin joins into Little Venice which is the junction of the Grand Union Canal and Regent’s Canal.

Little Venice is a neighbourhood at the junction of the Paddington Arm of the Grand Central Canal and Regent’s Canal. The area had been known as London’s Venice for a century or more before ‘Little’ was added. It is very pretty and an oasis of peace and tranquillity, home to many cafes and pubs. The name is usually attributed to Robert Browning but also sometimes to Lord Byron.

Regent’s Canal provides a link from Paddington Arm to Limehouse Basin and the River Thames. The canal is used for pleasure cruising and has a water bus service from Maida Vale to Regent’s Park Zoo and Camden Lock. We walked as far as Camden Lock and in this section the canal passed through two tunnels, one of about 300 m and the other about 75 m, while we walked on a road over the top. At Camden there is a very popular market with cafes, food stalls and vendors selling everything under the sun.

Walking alone the canals is always a peaceful experience. They are a great way to escape the busy streets and often hidden from surrounding buildings. The ones we saw today were very popular with walkers and cyclists. From Regent’s Canal we climbed to nearby Primrose Hill.

Primrose Hill is a district but it does have a hill, all of 66.7 metres above sea level, in the middle of a large park. The hill is very popular with we tourists because from its summit you get a good view of London’s skyline and can see for miles and miles.

Primrose Hill is adjacent to Regent’s Park and we walked through it back to the city. The park is one of the Royal Parks of London, officially The Regent’s Park, and is 410 acres. It was appropriated by Henry VIII on the dissolution of the monasteries. It has open parkland, a lake, sports pitches, playgrounds, flower gardens, nurseries, the London Zoo, and an open air theatre.

We were flagging a bit at this stage so stopped at a café called The Hub for a double espresso. The cafe was circular, on the top of a little mound and surround in all directions by cricket pitches.

Just outside (The) Regent’s Park is Baker Street so we went to gawk at 221B with all the others. There is a Sherlock Holmes museum at 221B Baker St but it is really 239. When Arthur Conan Doyle wrote the stories and created the fictional home of Sherlock Holmes, Baker St did not go as far as 221, this didn’t happen until the 1930s. At this time a building society building was allocated the numbers 215 to 229. There never was a 221B. In 1990 the Sherlock Holmes Museum which was at 239 was reallocated the number 221B even though it is out of sequence with all the other numbers in the street.

Next to 221B is a Beatles Shop. Basically full of Beatles labelled crap. Maybe I’m biased as although I like Beatles music now I was much more of a Stones fan in my youth.

A warm, sunny day today with no wind. Great day for a cycle ride.

We had pre-booked a 3 hour guided cycle tour with Tally Ho! Bike Tours. They are based in a couple of shipping containers in a scruffy lot in Lambeth, just on the south side of the Thames. There are several companies offering pretty much the same tours but Tally Ho! use Pashley Cycles so that is why we chose them.

Pashley bikes are made by hand in Stratford-Upon-Avon and the designs haven’t changed much since the company was founded in 1926. They are very sturdy, quite heavy steel frame bikes and have only 3 or 5 gears. They have a very upright riding position and you should really be wearing tweed to look the part.

Our guide was a lovely man called Tristan who is a musician and actor when not being a bicycle guide. We were his only customers today so we had our own personal tour. We had chosen to cycle on a Sunday morning figuring that would be the time with the least traffic on the roads.

Thanks to Boris Johnson, former Mayor of London and now Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in the UK Government, London has an extensive network of cycle paths through the parks, and cycle lanes in the streets.

It was great to be going more than 3 miles per hour, scaring pedestrians with our Pashley musical bells, bouncing over the cobble stones and running red lights like cyclists everywhere. You can see an awful lot in 3 hours cruising around on a bicycle. They have several themed tours, this one covered some of the London classics: Westminster Abbey, Parliament Square, Buckingham Palace (for the changing of the guard), Covent Garden, the theatre district, Archbishop of Canterbury’s Palace, Leake Street, lots of quiet little streets and squares etc.

After a couple of hours we had a coffee stop at an upmarket coffee shop called Notes in Covent Garden. £11.50 ($23) for two rather weak long blacks and sumptuous chocolate brownies.

Last stop on the tour was the Leake Street Tunnel. A very unsavoury looking place under a railway viaduct. It is alleged Banksy, the anonymous graffiti artist and political activist, did some of his work in the tunnel. Now anyone is allowed to do any spray can work they like on the walls and ceiling. Tristram produced a spray can and we both added to the graffiti art. Or perhaps we just defaced it.

Walked back via Piccadilly Circus and Covent Garden both with so, so many people everywhere.

We have decided not to use the Underground or the buses and have not purchased an Oyster Card. This is a deliberate decision to get us walking and keep our fitness level up for the South West Coast Path. Today started with another walk across Hyde Park, then across Green Park, then across St James Park to Westminster and the Churchill War Rooms.

A couple of months ago we went to see the movie Darkest Hour which covers about a week of Winston Churchill’s life in 1940 when he became Prime Minister and WWII was going very badly for The United Kingdom and its allies. Many scenes in the film are set in the War Rooms. Barbara had visited the War Rooms four years ago and thought I would be interested and enjoy it. Which I did. So spent a couple of hours back in the 1940s and Barbara sat on a bench reading her book and watching the present world go by.

We were there for opening at 10.00 am and fortunately the queue was very small. Inside the space is very tight with narrow winding corridors and small rooms. For this reason they restrict access to waves of 15 at a time about every 10 minutes. Later in the day the queues get very long with waits of up to 2 hours. I was inside in just a few minutes.

The Churchill War Rooms is a museum run by The Imperial War Museum. It is an underground complex that housed a British Government command centre throughout the Second World War. In 1938, with war looming the government decided to build a temporary command centre in the basement of the then new building the New Public Offices (now HM Treasury). The basement was strengthened and communication, sound proofing, ventilation and broadcasting equipment was installed. The War Rooms were completed one week before the declaration of war in Sept. 1939. At the height of the Blitz bombing an additional 5 feet slab of concrete was added to the roof of the basement.

The Rooms include the Map Room, the Cabinet Room, the Transatlantic Telephone Room, Churchill’s office-bedroom, accommodation and facilities for military staff, telephone switchboard rooms, etc. As you can imagine it is a rabbit warren of tight corridors and small rooms squeezed into the basement of an existing building. It was used continuously until the end of WWII on VJ Day, and then abandoned.

The Rooms were opened to the public as a museum in 1984 and expanded in the 2000s to include an area which had been Churchill and his wife and close associates accommodation. This became a museum dedicated to the life of Sir Winston Churchill. This is a fascinating step back in time which I thoroughly enjoyed. You each get a hand held listening device and press a button for each room to get an excellent commentary.

The Churchill Museum has all the latest whizz bang technology to skilfully present the 90 year, distinguished life of a complex and complicated man. It has deservedly won many awards. Of course there is a lovely tea shop and a huge gift shop, the biggest space in the complex.

From the War Rooms we went around the corner to Horse Guards Parade where they were just about to change the guard. This involved lots of screeched orders and slapping of horses if they moved a muscle. It is amazing how many people think they can go up to a horse on guard duty and have a selfie patting the horses nose or hugging it around the neck.

Then to Trafalgar Square where there was a huge crowd of people. All the Morris Dancing groups in the City of Westminster had gathered to put on a show. This was great. Lots of jangling bells, crashing of sticks and hopping around on one foot. The dancers were having a wonderful time and the crowd absolutely loved it.

For the second holiday in a row I have forgotten to bring the battery charger for my camera so we made our way to the chaos and crowds of Oxford Street to find Jessops Camera Shop were I duly bought yet another (rather expensive!) charger. I now have three so if anyone wants a universal battery charger just let me know.

Unfortunately it was now raining, we didn’t have all our rain gear and were getting quite wet. We picked up a Boots Pharmacy Meal Deal (drink + sandwich/pasta + fruit/chips/bar) £3.99 and retreated to our hotel to dry out.

What do you do on a rainy Saturday afternoon? Why of course you go to the mall. Not ‘The Mall’ which goes from Buckingham Palace to Trafalgar Square, but the shopping mall. The nearest one to us was actually at Paddington Station. This is one of seven railway stations in London and is large but by no means the largest. From here trains go to the suburbs and further afield out to the west. Somewhere down below are two underground tube stations. It has all the shops of a regular shopping mall and an extensive food hall. This station is where we arrived at midnight the other day and where we return from Plymouth in about 6 weeks.

We met two new friends, Paddington Bear and Isambard Kingdom Brunel one of the great engineering geniuses of the 19^th century, who among a vast catalogue of other achievements (designing tunnels, bridges, railways, ships etc, etc) designed this railway station.

Tomorrow we go cycling, let’s hope for no rain.

Our heads and our hearts are still confused and bewildered with the effects of jet lag. Flying is a strange experience. Crammed so closely together with strangers in a steel tube. Emerging now and then into the unnatural spaces that are airport terminals. These spaces are divorced from reality, no sense of place or time. Outside it can be dark or light, hot or cold, dry or wet, Antarctica or Abu Dhabi. Who would know? The world may have ended. Inside the terminal it is always the same artificial environment, everywhere in the world, probably everywhere in the universe. They are populated by Zombies wandering around with crooked necks looking up at the slowly changing secret codes on huge screens. Dreading the sight of the cursed words ‘Flight Delayed’.

We needed to get our heads together, not yet ready for the noise, the intensity, the pace of a great city. For me the best thing about London is its open spaces. 47% of London is green space, there are 3,000 gardens, 8 million trees (the world’s largest urban forest) and 13,000 species including us. Seven royal parks, 45 square kilometres of public parks and gardens in the City of London.

So we spent most of the day in Hyde Park, one of the greatest city parks in the world and the old hunting ground of Henry VIII. It is the largest of four Royal Parks that form a chain through London. A quiet day wandering in the meadows enjoying a warm, sunny spring day. What follows is a description of three places of interest that appealed to us.

Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fountain. This an oval of Cornish granite slabs on the side of a gently sloping grassy hill. The oval is about 50m x 80m and the 545 slabs are shaped in many ways and form a channel like a stream bed. Water is pumped in at the top of the oval and flows down each side to meet at a pool at the bottom. One side of the stream bed descends fairly smoothly to the downhill end of the oval with gentle ripples; the other side consists of a variety of steps, rills, curves, and other shapes so that the water plays in interesting ways as it flows to the tranquil pool at the bottom. The two sides were intended to show two sides of Diana’s life: happy times, and turmoil.

You are allowed to sit on the edge of the channel and put your feet on, or walk in, the water. There are three little bridges so you can walk on the inside or outside of the oval. The play of light on the water is fascinating as it glides or slithers or tumbles over the various surfaces shaped into the granite. But the thing that interested me most was the sound. The artists Kathryn Gustafson and Neil Porter have created the sounds that water makes as it tinkles, splashes, surges or drips its way down the slope. All by just varying the shape and texture of the surface of the granite. At one point you swear large boulders are rumbling underwater down the slope but it is just the effect of some jets of water pushing up into a gentle flow of water.

Henry Moore Arch. This 6 metre high megalith of 7 large Italian travertine stones weighs nearly 40 tonnes and is shaped as an arch. It is located on the side of a grassy slope overlooking the Long Water of the Serpentine Lake. You can stand looking through the arch, across the Serpentine and through a long avenue of trees to Kensington Palace in the distance. It is a masterful composition but unfortunately is fenced off so you can’t walk through or around or touch the arch.  Maybe because in the past it was deemed unsafe and has been disassembled, reinforced and reassembled.

The War Memorials. On a large traffic island opposite Hyde Park Corner, between Hyde Park and Green Park, there is a collection of war memorials. In the middle of the island and dominating everything else is the Wellington Arch. A victory arch proclaiming Wellington’s defeat of Napoleon. On top of a huge ceremonial classical arch, with heavy iron gates, sits the largest bronze statue in Europe depicting the Angel of Peace descending on Quadriga, the four horsed chariot of war.

Facing this is the Royal Artillery Memorial in a much soberer style. A stone and marble pile topped with a one third over-sized stone sculpture of a howitzer. Even with the over sizing, the gun seems like a toy compared to the huge sculptures of four artillerymen. Stone reliefs show realistic scenes from WWI, unusual at the time.

Next to this is the Australian War Memorial. This is a fairly modern grey-green granite semi circular curved wall in a slight dip forming an amphitheatre. The granite stones are inscribed with over 24,000 names of the villages and towns that Australian soldiers came from to go and fight our wars. You have to go up close as the names are quite small, about 25 mm high, but are cleverly inscribed so that standing further back you read in a much larger font the names of the 47 battles in which Australians have been involved, eg Lone Pine, Singapore, Gallipoli.

Opposite is the NZ War Memorial. This is in total contrast to all the other memorials on the traffic island and in my totally biased opinion easily the most symbolic. It comprises 16 heavy metal cross shaped girders projecting from the ground at an angle. From a distance the black painted girders look like the posture of warriors doing a haka, or the barrels of shouldered rifles, or soldiers in marching formation. The top of the girders are cut off at an angle and are polished and shiny and so they look like cross shaped grave markers. Up close the girders are decorated with texts, names, patterns, symbols, flowers, ferns etc symbolic of NZ.

The whole affair is set on a slightly sloping mound and the walking path goes right through it so you approach it from a distance, walk through it, see it close up, touch it. I think sculptor Paul Dibble and John Hardwick-Smith from Athfield Architects have done us proud but others have described it as ‘an infestation of public space’ and as ‘blisteringly unlovely’.

While at the war memorials a troop of The Queen’s Life Guard road past on immaculately groomed horses with breastplates shining in the sun. Each day they ride from the Hyde Park Barracks to Horse Guards Parade to change the Queen’s life guard. The is a different ceremony to changing the guard at Buckingham Palace.

We finally made it to our Paddington hotel at about 12.15 am. Fortunately the trains were still running at that late hour and there was still someone at the hotel reception desk to check us in. It had taken a fraction over 48 hours from walking out our apartment door to entering our hotel room. A large chunk of that time at Gate 33, Terminal 3, Abu Dhabi International Airport.

We weren’t feeling too bad having managed to grab a few snatches of sleep. Our bodies were feeling a bit strange, probably from the amount of food we had eaten in relation to the almost total lack of exercise we had for 2 days.

There are a few ways to get from Heathrow to Paddington, our destination in London. The Underground (cheapest if you have an Oyster card but a change of train lines required), National Express bus (second cheapest but goes to Victoria Station about 1½ km from our hotel), The Heathrow Express (fastest – a 15 minute nonstop train ride but expensive at £22), The Heathrow Connect (same train ride as Express but half the price and makes 6 stops along the way for commuters – so takes twice as long), a taxi (the most expensive at £50 – £80 but is door to door). We chose the Heathrow Connect.

We tried to buy a ticket before boarding but the sleepy lady in the ticket office told us not to worry, just purchase a ticket on the train. On the train however, about every three minutes, the intercom kept telling us that tickets must be pre-purchased and be available for inspection, tickets could not be purchased on the train, and anyone on the train without a ticket may be subject to a penalty fare.

So we sat in fear and trepidation for the 35 minute ride but no inspectors came to interrogate us and at Paddington we quickly alighted and disappeared like thieves into the darkness of the night.

Our hotel, Shakespeare Hotel, is about 2 minutes walk from Paddington Station and is one of many hotels surrounding a square – Norfolk Square. The square was built in the early 1800s and was a private garden for the use of the nobility and their servants who lived in the houses surrounding it. The ladies of the houses would take tea in the square, in the shade of the trees, served by their maids.

The square was privately owned and maintained by the residents up till the end of WWII when the local council took it over. The residents had their own constable who patrolled the area and acted as gateman.

The houses are all 5 story + basement terrace houses with a mews at the rear for horses and carriages. Over time the large houses were subdivided into flats and in recent times reconfigured into boutique hotels. The stables in the mews have now become expensive apartments.

Our hotel advertises itself as being proud to offer the best value for money and affordable accommodation in Paddington, ie it’s one of the cheapest in this part of London mainly because it doesn’t have a lift so can’t get a very high star rating. Luckily we are located on the ground floor. It has all the basics and lots of character but is a bit tired and worn out (I know that feeling) but a bit quirky which is just the sort of place we like. We are feeling very comfortable already.

When we arrive in London it will be almost exactly 40 years to the day since we first visited in May 1978. This got me thinking about the differences between then and now.

In 1978 we flew Wellington/Auckland/Nadi (Fiji)/Honolulu (Hawaii) to Los Angeles. After a two day stopover we flew Los Angeles/San Francisco/London over the polar route.

On the return it was London/Rome/Calcutta (now Kolkata)/Hong Kong. There may have been another stop, possibly Beirut, between Rome and Calcutta. After a two day stopover it was Hong Kong/Sydney/Wellington. Hong Kong was then still very much a British Territory (until 1997). All flights were Air NZ or British Airways. Air NZ on McDonnell Douglas DC8 and DC10, British Airways on Boeing 707 and 747.

There were no credit/debit cards as we know them, everybody used cash and traveller’s cheques (James Cook for UK and Europe, American Express for USA). Finding somewhere that would cash traveller’s cheques was often a pain. I had a Diner’s Club card but this was not technically a credit card but a ‘charge’ card as you had to pay any charges in full at the end of each month. ATMs were in widespread use in the UK but did not come to NZ until the 80s.

EFTPOS started in the USA in 1981 and was first used in NZ from 1985 in petrol stations.

1978 was still the technology dark ages. There were no personal computers yet. The internet as we know it didn’t exist. No Domain Names (1985), Google (1998), Wikipedia (2001), Facebook (2004), YouTube (2005), Twitter (2006).

The first (very, very small) commercial cellular telephone system had begun operation in the US. The first “public” mobile phone call in the UK wasn’t made until 1985. International telephone calls were hugely expensive and reserved for special occasions, Xmas, birthdays, emergencies, etc.

1978 in New Zealand:

Robert Muldoon was re-elected Prime Minister of NZ. Interestingly although National won most seats to be re-elected to government, Labour actually won most of the popular vote. Social Credit despite winning 16% of the vote gained only one seat. This was under the ‘first past the post’ system, long before MMP.

The Governor General was Sir Keith Holyoake.

The Mayor of Wellington was Michael Fowler.

After 48 years of trying, for the first time New Zealand beat England in a cricket test (at the Basin Reserve)

For the first time the All Blacks completed the ‘grand slam’ beating all four home unions Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales (the infamous Andy Haden dive test). The Irish will never let you forget that the All Blacks did lose to Munster.

It was the first time New Zealand’s population declined – largely due to emigration to Australia.

The international airline Air New Zealand (formerly TEAL) merged with the domestic airline NAC (National Airways Corporation) to form a single airline under the name Air New Zealand. It was 100% government owned.

At the Commonwealth Games in Alberta Canada, NZ won 5 gold, 6 silver and 9 bronze medals – total 20. In the just completed 2018 Games in Gold Coast Australia, NZ won 15 gold, 16 silver, and 15 bronze – total 46!

1978 in the United Kingdom:

The Monarch was Elizabeth II, in the 26^th year of her reign (now in the 66^th year).

Prince Charles had not yet married Lady Diana Spencer (she was 17 in 1978), they were to marry in 1981.

The Prime Minister of the UK was James Callaghan (Labour), Margaret Thatcher was the Leader of the Opposition. By 1982 Thatcher was Prime Minister but her government was on the brink of collapse when she took the gamble of going to war with Argentina to win back the Falkland Islands, and made her name in history.

Great Britain was part of the European Economic Community (joined 1975)

Inflation was 9.9%. Unemployment was 5.5% and rose to 12.5% (3,000,0000 people) in 1983.

Grease, Superman and Midnight Express were the big movies

The Bee Gees dominated music charts with tracks from Saturday Night Fever but mercifully disco fever was dying. Rod Stewart was asking everybody “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy”?

The world’s first IVF baby was born.

Our own three children were still years in the future. We were young, footloose and fancy free and enjoying our first big OE.

I had already been employed by the Wellington City Council for 10 years and only had another 30+ years to go!

For our self-guided walks in Spain and Ireland we used an Irish company, CaminoWays (also called IrelandWays for travel in Ireland), to organise our accommodation and transfer our bags each day. They were very good and all the arrangements on those walks went without a hitch.

However CaminoWays don’t do any walks in England so this year we are using a Scottish company, Macs Adventure. They do guided and self-guided walks and hikes all around the world.

Macs Adventure have 9 walks on the South West Coast Path and we have stitched together 5 of them and tweaked them a bit to suit the distances we want to walk and the locations where we want to stop. So they have booked all our accommodation on the Path and will transfer our bags each day.

They have sent us a small mountain of background reading, books, maps, direction instructions, and they also have an app to download for our tablet and phone.

We’ll have to try very hard to get lost this year.

Late breaking news, just in:

All the maps, books, instructions, apps, etc from Macs Adventure are now redundant.

Our very good friends Ann and Jerry have given us ‘A most useful map for hiking and walking’. This is the ideal map for breaking down a long walk into a leisurely series of comfortable strolls from Public House to Tea Room, to Tea Room, to Public House.

No worries, we will never go thirsty or hungry or ever get lost.

Thank you Ann and Jerry.